


THE RIDDLE

by omg_okimhere



Category: Original Work, Viking World
Genre: Death, F/M, Harm to Animals, Injury, Past Child Abuse, Threats of Rape/Non-Con, Vikings, but set in that world, not the series, with Original Characters
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-11-06
Updated: 2019-08-02
Packaged: 2019-08-19 19:37:45
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 16
Words: 22,048
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16540859
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/omg_okimhere/pseuds/omg_okimhere
Summary: This is a plot that has been rolling around in my head for years.  Originally, it was envisioned in a Native American setting, but that never seemed quite right.  I just recently flipped it to the Viking world, and suddenly it all gelled.  I credit much inspiration for the setting to the History Channel series Vikings.





	1. Chapter 1

Ancient of days she is, with skin like the birch that has seen seasons too many to number.  Her hair has long since given up growing.  Eyelids as thin as onionskin veil sockets bulging with rheumy orbs.  One earlobe droops with the weight of an earring made of goat’s horn.

 

She is not seated so much as poured into a pile of flesh amongst the reeds and furs that cover the floor of her hut.  She rocks back and forth, nostrils flaring with the scent of fir boughs and unnamed woodland herbs that smoulder in the smudge pots marking the four compass points.  When the bone curtain hanging over the doorway sounds its dry clattering, she raises her head, her voice breaking the air past her cracked lips.

 

“Enter, Romundr.”

 

Parting the skeletal strands with battle-scarred hands, the tall blond warrior ducks his way inside and places a loaf of flat barley bread, still warm from the hearth, into the old woman’s outstretched palm.  She tears off a piece at once and stuffs it greedily between the teeth she has left, as the man takes a cross-legged seat opposite.

 

“Greetings, Ancient Mother,” he says, leaning forward with forearms on knees, fighting his unease in this place of unknown power.

 

The elder takes her time devouring his offering, chewing loudly whilst regarding him through slitted eyes.  Finally she sets aside the round and speaks.

“What is it you seek, Romundr, son of Roarr?”  In her mind’s eye, she can already see the gnawing emptiness in his soul.  “What do you lack?”

 

Romundr drops his gaze, staring at his upturned palms and splayed fingers.

 

“That is what I came here for _you_ to tell _me_.”  He flips his hands over and brings them together, fiddling with his family ring as he always does when lost in thought.

 

“I have so much – meat and mead to spare, my health, my strength, my virility, riches and glorious adventure.”  His jaw and his fists clench as one, highlighting his emotion.  “Yet I have a hollow pit inside, like a stone in my stomach.”

 

Pushing her sleeves past the row of runes tattooed up her forearms, the seer produces a handful of tiny wrist bones and scatters them into her lap.  She studies the pattern at length, as Romundr seethes inwardly with impatience.

 

“What is the one thing easiest to possess, and most elusive to own?”  This final reading, given in a strange sing-song, hangs in the fragrant air like a feather too light to find its way to earth.

 

“Pah!” Romundr spits out.  “What is this nonsense, old woman?  I come to you for wisdom, and you answer my questions with a riddle?”  He lumbers angrily to his feet and storms out, followed by the sound of cackling at his back.

 

Once again under the light of day, he runs his palm over the flat planes of his face, rubbing his oft-broken nose, clearing his mind and his senses.

“Hey-o!” calls a loud voice on his left.  “Romundr!”

 

Turning, he spies the stocky figure of Ginnar, the shipwright, and one of his most notable sparring partners. Today it seems Ginnar is in his fighter-mode, for he wears his leathers and has the long red locks that flow from his half-shaved pate braided in a single rope down his spine.

 

“Hunting party tomorrow,” he declares brusquely.  “Will you come with?”  The wide gap between his front teeth lends a fraction more air to his speech patterns.

 

Without a word, Romundr feints and draws his blade.  Ginnar responds quickly, and they trade several clanging blows before breaking off, lungs heaving with exertion and mirth.

 

“Of course!” agrees Romundr heartily.  “Which direction?”

 

“Up the coast.”  Ginnar sheathes his steel and claps his friend on the back.  “The drought will have driven the reindeer further south than normal.”  He grins.  “Tomorrow we feast and make sacrifice to the gods.”

 

***************

 

The cluster of wide conical tents is a beehive of activity.  Squealing children in skirted costumes run through the camp, their noise level suggestive of twice their number.  Adults move about tending their tasks, all clad in belted anoraks of sage green wool and leather, all women.  The younger ones have their hair in twin braids, the more mature among them wear skull-fitting caps trimmed with colourful bands.  One group is combining their efforts to stretch a new hide taut against the row of curing racks.  Others are tending cauldrons, rendering fat, making stew.

 

Outside her _lavvu_ , a lone female figure is hunched over the form-cut pelt in her hands.  Strong fingers grip a leaf-shaped blade, scraping the underside of the deerskin until it is supple, until it is ready to become a new pair of boots.  She wriggles her toes inside the upturned tips of her old footwear, now torn and close to worn through on the soles.  On the morrow she will bask in comfort.

 

Her husband used to make shoes for them – until he perished of a fever during the last snows.  Now she fends for herself, whilst fending off the unwanted proposals of the other men.  Not a one of them appeals to her fancy.  Thank the gods, they are all away at the moment, rounding up the reindeer for the autumn drive.

 

Eventually, she takes the tip of her knife and punches holes in the hide along proper intervals, then untwines a length of sinew from where she’s had it draped over a decorative disc on her belt.  Round buttons now, signifying her repeat status as unmarried.

 

“Kollgata!”  The self-proclaimed chieftess of cooking walks up with careful steps, cradling a dripping ladle.  “Taste the stew.”

 

Obediently, Kollgata lays down her sewing, pursing her lips for a cautious sip.  The pungent meat aroma assaults her mouth and nostrils, almost overpowering her taste buds.  This was an old animal indeed.

 

“Do we have any dried cloudberries left?” she asks diplomatically, wiping the corner of one eye.

 

“I think not,” the cook responds curtly.  It perturbs her, to consult this one’s palate, even though she does have a gift with the herbs.

 

“Then juniper,” pleads Kollgata.  “A generous measure of juniper – to cut the sharpness.”

 

*****************

 

“Sami.”

 

Cupping his hands on either side of his face to concentrate the light, Rothergus confirms his assessment, then throws a war-like fist in the air.  Around him in the underbrush, the Northmen hunting party entertains varying degrees of excitement.  A chase after reindeer always carries the chance of an encounter with the nomadic tribes that herd the shaggy ungulates and base their entire subsistence in them.  Usually an easy conquest – the Sami are not organized as fighters.

 

Pushing his way roughly past the others, Romundr gathers in the encampment with his gaze, his heart uneasy.  He knows only too well what Rothergus and his cadre are likely to do with this find.  He exchanges an uncomfortable look with Ginnar.

 

“Leave them be, Gus,” Romundr urges.  “I see children.”

 

“And women,” counters Rothergus with a cruel leer.  Waving a tattooed arm, he leads his gang forward, unbelting his axe as they creep to the edge of the clearing.

 

Romundr and Ginnar hang back, wanting no part of the rape and slaughter that is sure to ensue, knowing they are relatively helpless to prevent it.

 

*****************

 

Many have been the times that Kollgata has cursed her nervous bladder, yet on this day, it saves her life.  She hears the screams as she is re-tying her leggings, and remains hidden behind the _lavvu_ , watching in horror as a band of berserkers overruns the camp, striking down some of the women, dragging others off to the sidelines, ignoring the terrified children scattering into the woods.

 

She whips her head around wildly, looking for escape, but there is another invader now, walking across the open space as though not even part of the battle.

 

He will see her.

 

With her heart pounding in her chest, she slips under the back edge of the tentskin to hide inside.

 

***************

 

Face set in stoic disgust, Romundr stomps past the bodies littering the ground.  He detests the mindset of some of the men -- Rothergus and his ilk – who would prey on the weak.   Glorious battle with worthy enemies is the way to Valhalla, not forcing and killing innocent women.

 

However, he may as well see if there is anything of value with the Finna.  They are known for their silverwork, that much is true.  One of their curious lodge pole dwellings stands before him, inviting exploration.

 

He is forced to hunch his shoulders significantly to squeeze through the triangular opening.  That is his undoing. 

 

Out of nowhere, something solid breaks again his skull, sending pottery shards flying.  In the dazed seconds following, a lightweight figure jumps him from behind.  In the corner of his eye, Romundr sees a slender hand wielding a small knife reaching for his throat. 

 

He twists and flips his attacker to the ground, all grappling limbs and clawing hands, pinning a wrist until the blade is released, even as the opposite fist yanks HARD on one of the braids hanging from his temples.  Roaring, he pins that arm in the dirt as well, and peers down into the defiant dark eyes of a woman.

 

Some part of Kollgata’s brain registers his gaze, as clear and ice-blue as the fjord in spring.  His brute strength is terrifying, yet their struggle has been somehow exhilarating, too.  She knows he could break her in half with his bare hands if he so desired.  And yet, he only holds her still, his body against hers, his breath in her face, as though both are spellbound.

 

It takes a moment for either of them to realize when the light changes, when the doorway is blocked by a body.

 

“Ha!” exclaims Rothergus condescendingly.  “I see you got one for yourself after all.”

 

Spell broken, Romundr rolls to a seated position, dragging Kollgata up with him and cuffing her arms behind her back with one of his large hands.

 

Rothergus drops his eyes to Romundr’s fully clothed loins.

 

“Something not working?” he sneers.  “I can take over.”  He steps confidently towards the pair on the ground.

 

Romundr hauls both of them to their feet and covers his swordhilt. 

 

“I claim this one as slave.”

 

The two men, who have clashed many times in the past, stare long and hard at one another.  Finally, Rothergus breaks away with an eyeroll.

 

“Fuck her and slit her throat,” he advises.  “We have thralls aplenty at Hafnarfjall.”

 

Romundr relaxes not, until after his nemesis is well gone.  Then he turns to the woman, who immediately tries to pull away.

 

“Stop struggling,” he mutters, believing he speaks only for his ears.  “I’m not going to rape you.”

 

Kollgata stills at once, and Romundr eyes her carefully.  “If I release your hands, you will not run?”  He lessens the pressure of his grip slightly.

 

Kollgata nods slowly, and after a thoughtful moment, Romundr frees her.

 

“How is it you understand my speech?” he wonders, as she rubs her bruised skin.  He has never carried on a conversation with a Finna, only run them down in battle.

 

“It is not so different than mine,” Kollgata replies with an odd lilt and an over-extension of the vowels.

 

Romundr hides a smile, a bit charmed by her inflection.

 

“Gather up anything of value you wish to bring away,” he commands gruffly.  Kollgata’s eyes dart from his face to the ground.

 

Quick as a snake, Romundr covers her knife with his boot, before she can get to it.  Picking it up, he runs the edge across the ball of this thumb, bringing to light a line of red.

 

He nods appreciatively – skilled knife makers, as well.

 

“I will just keep this,” he announces with a satisfied smirk, as he slips it inside a rung on his belt.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 


	2. Chapter Two

Tongues of flame flicker high into the nightsky, sending their fiery spawn to disappear on the updraft, casting an eerie glow on the men cavorting around the campfire.  The corpses have been piled and torched, the stew has been consumed, the Sami store of fermented reindeer milk has been liberated.  Now most of the hunters are singing songs of valor and telling tall tales of war, their faces painted with the blood of their victims.

 

In the shadows stands a group apart – Ginnar and the four children who fled into the forest, and Romundr with his newly-acquired slave tied to him, waist-to-waist.  Kollgata is attempting to console the battle-shocked youngsters, while the men carry on a conversation too rapid and low of volume for her to make out.

 

“What will you do with the younglings?” inquires Romundr, bemused.  He knows his friend’s woman, Birgit, has not been able to give him sons of their own.  This looks like a ready-made family -- two boys of about ten, and two younger girls.

 

Ginnar shrugs.  “They can serve as servants in someone’s household.  Better than starving in the woods.”

 

“You could use some extra hands in the shipyard,” observes Romundr archly.

 

“I could,” agrees Ginnar, his voice curt.  “And what is your excuse?  What will you do with a hearth wench?”  He snorts knowingly.

 

Romundr spreads his hands in exaggeration and looks at his feet.  “I have many socks that need mending.”

 

He then glances at Ginnar’s quartet of charges.  “Will you break for Hafnarfjall?  These are a bit young to bring on a hunt.”  His sarcasm is good-natured.

 

“In the morn.  You?”

 

Romundr nods.  “I am fair sickened by Rothergus and his band.”

 

As though summoned by some fell energy, Rothergus careens out of the darkness, still in the act of adjusting himself after a piss.  When he becomes aware of their presence he pauses, running his too-bright eyes over them all, lingering long on the woman.

 

“How much for a go with your thrall, Romundr?” he taunts drunkenly.  Kollgata hears him all too well, and instinctively moves closer to Romundr.  He pushes her behind his back.

 

“There is no price.”

 

Startled, Kollgata stares in wary wonder at his rear profile.

 

After a moment, Rothergus spits his derision into the dust.  “You always were a selfish bastard,” he declares with an angry glare, before weaving his way back to the fire ring.

 

“Perhaps we should leave tonight?” suggests Ginnar, detecting a distinct air of unwelcome.

 

“I am weary,” counters Romundr, gently pulling on the connecting rope and stepping towards Kollgata’s tent.  “We can be gone before they’ve slept it off.  Besides,” he adds with a grin, “you have four mouths to feed.”

 

*****************

 

One by one, Kollgata lights the candles around the inside perimeter of the _lavvu_ , taking as much time as she dares, keeping her vision averted.  She can only believe the time has come for this man to assert his ownership.  Should she fight?  He will only kill her if she does.  Better to live another day, she decides.  There is always hope.

 

Meanwhile, Romundr takes in his simple surroundings with curiosity – birch poles angled to the sky, covered in hides; a small wooden box of belongings; a mound of rushes and furs for sleeping.  The interior is so small, the woman can reach the edges easily while still on her tether.

 

Too soon, the wicks are all lit.  Kollgata thoroughly extinguishes the tinderstick and adds it to the tangle of dried vegetation that cushions her bed, then studies the ground.

 

The silence grows long, the mood awkward.  Eventually, Romundr clears his throat.

 

“Look at me.”

 

Slowly, Kollgata raises her eyes, exuding pride in the midst of her apprehension.

 

“How are you called?” he asks pragmatically.

 

“Kollgata.”  She rolls the word off her tongue, taking strength from the power in naming.

 

He repeats it carefully, then offers, “I am Romundr.”

 

She tilts her head.  “Is that what I am to call you?  Not lord?  Or master?”  The buzz of derision in her tone is ever so slight, like the nattering of the nuthatch circling the tree trunks in winter.

 

He seems amused by her question.  “You may call me bastard or worse behind my back, but to my face – Romundr.”

 

“Yes.  Romundr.”  She takes a deep breath.  “What shall I do next?”

 

He pulls her closer by means of the rope, encountering only token resistance.

 

“You know what the other men expect will happen,” he challenges.

 

“I am not a fool,” Kollgata says dully.

 

He pauses, seeming to consider something before his lips part again.

 

“I will make a bargain with you, Kollgata.”

 

Caught offguard, Kollgata looks up past his bearded chin into his eyes.  His voice is entirely too much like a caress.  Aware of his breath and his scent, she waits.

 

“I do not wish to force you,” Romundr admits gruffly.  

 

Which is not to say he wouldn’t enjoy bedding such a comely wench.  Her single-plaited dark locks have come half-undone during their struggle, and now frame her face like the wings of a raven.  Her square jaw is softened by a full mouth, a mouth pressed together in mistrust at the moment.  He wonders how she might look if she smiled.  Her high cheekbones lend a slant of mystery to her gaze.  But it is her eyes that draw him most – near-black pools of hidden fire.

 

Yet he knows fear is a wearying way to engage with another.

 

“I will not claim you physically,” he continues at length, “so long as you pretend to the rest of the world that I have.”

 

Kollgata can only gape at him.  What sort of trickery is this?

 

“You would save face,” she calls it.

 

“I would,” he shrugs.  “Do we have a deal, or…”  He leaves the remainder unsaid.

 

“I will tell them you have a staff to rival Odin’s,” she interjects hastily.

 

Romundr snorts at her cheekiness.  “I do,” he counters over his shoulder, as he descends onto the bed mound and makes himself comfortable.  “Looks like there is only the one sleeping spot.  We’ll have to share.”  He holds the pelt up for her to join him. 

 

Kollgata does not move.

 

“Sleep in the dirt if you do not trust me.”  He drops the edge of the fur blanket with a careless air.  “It will be cold tonight.”

 

“What good are the promises of your people?” throws back Kollgata bitterly.  These sea-faring raiders have a fearsome reputation among the Sami.

 

Romundr sighs.  “I am not ‘my people’.”  Twisting up on one elbow, he tries once more to mollify her.

 

“Listen to me.  I can take you anytime I wish.  If I meant to, I would have done so by now.”  He raises the fur one last time.  “If I were you, I would take a chance, rather than risk frostbite.”

 

After several seconds of rueful reflection, Kollgata steps quickly to the bed and slips under the pelt, turning her back against his chest and lying rigid as a plank.  With a grunt, Romundr rolls over, facing the opposite way, equally tense.

 

Slumber does not come easily to either of them.

 

 

 


	3. Chapter 3

Hanging their shaggy heads, two squat, sturdy ponies plod along the faint path, each led by a man on foot.  On their backs, the horses carry a pair of children apiece.  One of the men also has a woman roped to his person.  For most of the day, the strange party has been skirting the massive grey bare-shouldered mountain.  Now they round the last curve of the terrain and meet the ocean.  Turning south, they soon reach the edge of the settlement that nestles at the foot of the peak.

 

Hafnarfjall.

 

Wooden huts and turf houses and open-fronted craftsman’s stalls; docks furling out into the water, rowboats tied in place at intervals; longships standing out in the harbor.  The Great Hall backed against the upslope, looming over its people, both a refuge and reminder of power.

 

Hafnarfjall.

 

Romundr and Ginnar share a grin when the familiar sights and sounds and smells hit their senses.  Crows discussing how to best breach the nets covering the racks of drying codfish; goats bleating their displeasure at being driven by boys with sticks; the pounding of a drum; the calls of gulls; the scent of cookfires; the stench of rotting seaweed.

 

Home.

 

To Romundr, it looks much the same as it did when he arrived a dozen years ago, fleeing the village he’d grown up in and the madness of its ruler.  Eorl Hafnar is less crazy than most, stern yet for the most part benevolent, so long as he is not crossed.  It is said he bears the mark of Odin from birth, in the blood red burst on his left cheek.  Every spring and every fall, he leads a raiding party to the south, claiming what riches and provisions he can from the peoples across the water.  Soon it will be time for another foray.

 

As the returning travellers weave amongst the everyday activities, Kollgata looks around in curiosity.  All she has ever seen of the Northmen is the warriors who attacked her camp.  All she has ever heard of the Northmen is the tales of horror told around the campfires.  To see them in their homes, with their women and children, living their lives, is a revelation.

 

The grounds are tidy.  The children are clean and well-fed.  The women are industrious and strong; most wear their hair in elaborate braids.  Some have blackened the rims of their eyes, making them appear intense or fierce, or perhaps seductive.

 

The men are all long-haired and bearded.  Many have shaved portions of their scalps to display blue brands of intricate patterning.  Some, like Ginnar, have twined their illustrious beards into twin forks, secured with beads.  Others, like Romundr, wear braids hanging at their temples, amongst otherwise free-flowing locks.  Those doing the most menial of tasks all have their scalps shorn. The vast majority of the citizens are light-haired or ginger-capped – very few dark heads like hers.

 

Everyone seems to have a task to do, though a few pause to observe their passing.  One of the men shouts out with interest.

 

“Roarsson!  What have you brought us?”

 

Romundr hands the halter of his horse to Ginnar, who breaks off for his own homestead with the youngsters.  Then, guiding his and Kollgata’s footsteps in the direction of his abode, Romundr waves a careless hand in answer.

 

“You know the spoils of the hunt belong to the hunter.”

 

The other man smirks, laughing heartily, and returns to the roof he is repairing.

 

Once the two reach Romundr’s shack, Kollgata stops outside, uncertain.  She turns to Romundr, only to shrink back in alarm when he pulls his knife with great flourish and purpose.

 

He eyes her sharply, then bends a clutch of rope in half with one hand and slices it, freeing her.

 

“There is nowhere for you to run.”

 

Kollgata thoughts turn fleetingly to the horses and the possibility of stealing one.  Yet she has no doubt they are guarded.  And how would she find another band of her nomadic tribe on the vast tundra? 

 

She meets Romundr’s scrutiny gravely, holding his gaze long before responding.

 

“This I know,” she admits finally, her square face pinched.  Hard as it is to stomach, her best chance of survival is here.

 

Nodding curtly, as though something has been decided, Romundr ushers her inside with almost courtly deference. 

 

********************

 

“All thralls must be cut.  Only the free folk may wear their hair long.”

 

Romundr has barely had time for relaxation after their journey, before the mistress of slaves appears at his hut, brandishing her shears.  Looking pained, he allows her entry, while Kollgata glances up from sweeping.

 

The beefy woman beckons rudely, clicking her blades in impatience.

 

“Your hair, Finna.”

 

Kollgata shakes her head, defiant, dislodging a stubborn tendril that always refuses to stay in its braid.  Her fingers tighten on the handle of the broom.

 

Narrowing her eyes in anger, the matron makes a quick, aggressive move in Kollgata’s direction.

 

But it is not quick enough.

 

Swinging the coarse broom head into the woman’s face and cracking the handle across that one’s forearm, Kollgata sends the scissors to the floor.  She dives for the blades, only to find Romundr once again atop her.

 

“I will not submit to this,” she spits into his face.  Her hair is her vanity.  If she must lose all other individuality and autonomy, she will make a stand on this one thing.

 

“I will not,” she says again, her small frame full of vehemence.

 

“I can see that,” replies Romundr, suppressing a smile while he pulls her to her feet as though she were made of straw.

 

With a courteous nod to the disgruntled overseer, he offers back the shears.  “Leave this one be.”

 

“It is the law.”  She snatches up her property.

 

“It is a custom,” fires back Romundr.  “My thrall, my law.”

 

“And what about my injury?”  The woman rubs the inside of her arm, clearly expecting recompense.

 

“Take whatever you like from my foodstores,” sighs Romundr.  “Within reason.”  He will inventory the sod-covered cellar before nightfall, to be sure of her honesty.

 

Mollified, the matron shrugs her agreement and departs, leaving the door wide.  Romundr pulls the stone-and-rope latch behind her, then turns, hands on hips, to regard his slave.

 

“You are costing me more than I bargained for, Kollgata.”  His tone is indulgent --he rather likes her locks long.  It is a good bargain.

 

Without a word, Kollgata unravels her braid and resumes her chores.

 

********************

 

And so the days pass, falling into a rhythm.  Romundr goes on about his business as usual, but he awakens to a meal and ends the day with one as well.  His socks and tunics get mended.  His hut is more or less tidy.  The hearth is always stoked.  Kollgata is quiet in his presence, speaking only when spoken to, concealing volumes in her watchful gaze.  In time, he begins to wish to draw her out.  He finds her to be a skilled cook, deft in her use of herbs, and so he tries complimenting the meals – only to earn a longer stare from her small dark eyes.

 

Kollgata finds her existence in the Northmen’s world not unpleasant, though she is made to wear a coiled metal ankle bracelet to signify her position of servitude.  When she is not tending the abode of her keeper, she joins the other thralls in more community-oriented tasks, such as cleaning fish, hauling water, stacking wood – whatever she is told.

 

One day, a dusky-skinned girl named Amina, who receives a great deal of male attention, quietly pulls Kollgata aside and offers her a handful of leaves.

 

“No baby,” she whispers, miming a mouthful of greens as a snack.

 

Kollgata recognizes the plant as one she knows will keep a woman’s womb from quickening.  Almost she declines it as unnecessary, but then remembers the façade.

 

“ _Tak_ ,” she murmurs with an overly grateful smile for show.  No harm in being prepared.

 

True to his word, Romundr has not touched her, though he has given her quite a shock, that first morning in Hafnarfjall.  It is a memory that buoys many a tedious hour of labor:

 

_“Good morn,” he greets her back, as she stirs the fire to life._

_Kollgata turns with a round of bread in each hand, and nearly drops them both, upon finding a sleep-groggy vision of naked manhood stretching his spine to the ceiling._

_His tanned torso is compact and powerful, his hips narrow, his rear muscles well-rounded.  His shoulders are broad without being hulking.  His arms are as though sculpted from living stone.  All his limbs reveal the subtle contours of the long sinews within.  Unlike the men of her people, he carries little hair on most of his body, affording her a detailed study.  She is unable to pull her eyes away._

_She sees he has not been untruthful with her._

 

_The second most striking frontal element is the image in ink that covers his chest – a black raven silhouetted in flight, with wings spread across each pectoral.  Kollgata feels her pulse rise._

_Seemingly devoid of modesty, Romundr squats in front of the morning basin that sits before the hearth, vigorously scrubbing his face and beard.  Meanwhile, Kollgata steals a peek from the corner of her eye, observing that which hangs nearly to the floor when he sits on his haunches.  At least one legend of the Northmen appears true._

_When he pulls on a tunic and trousers and wanders outside, she is forced to fall into a chair to collect her composure._

_It has been far too long since she was so close to an unclothed man._

 


	4. Chapter 4

The shallow rowboat bangs into the dock, its gunwales nearly awash from the weight of the day’s catch.  Romundr and another man leap to the planks and begin to heave on the nets, while two others feed the dripping haul off the floor of the large skiff. A sharp breeze knifes the air, promising a storm.  Thor sends many such days in early autumn, celebrating his might and invigorating his people.  And driving the nice summer-fat codfish into the Northmen’s underwater snares.

 

A work party of female thralls rushes forward from land, paired two by two, each hoisting opposite handles of enormous baskets between them.  Crouching to tie the bow off to a pylon, Romundr glances up at the sound of their approach.  From amongst the babble of feminine chatter a laugh rings out, hearty and genuine, and his roving eyes find the source.  He watches in fascination, to see Kollgata smiling, relaxed, sharing a joke with her partner, the dark-skinned one from the southern seas.  They are a comely pair, and many a male eye is upon them.

 

“Lucky man!”

 

Rothergus swaggers up and claps Romundr on the back as he straightens to his feet.  “Does she bring her friend home for you too?”

 

Turning away, as much from the unwelcome touch from an adversary as to keep himself unseen, Romundr murmurs, “She would if I commanded so.”  It is the boastful answer expected of him.

 

“Do not waste time being shy about it,” advises Rothergus, sharing a grin with his companion. “The southern wench looks tasty to us.”  He has his younger brother Torvald in tow – a weaker, venal version of himself in every way, including appearance.  No one could ever doubt the two are siblings.

 

“I might prefer the one with longer hair,” interjects Torvald on a whim, licking his chapped lips.

 

Keeping his back to the flow of thralls, Romundr growls low and menacingly.  “I cannot govern the things you do with the other slaves.  But you will not touch a hair on the head of my slave, under penalty of the _ting_.”  His property rights are ironclad under the eorl’s law.  The brothers take the reminder with their customary ill-humour.

 

Meanwhile, the women walk past oblivious of Romundr’s presence.  He is not noticed, even when he sneaks another side-long look at Kollgata’s animated face, and finds some part of him wistfully wishing she would show that face to him.

 

***************

 

The rustling coming from behind the hanging hide is mysterious; Romundr can only guess at what is happening.  The longer it goes on, the more his imagination paints compelling pictures for him.  Finally a corner flaps up, and Kollgata emerges with a small bowl of brown paste. 

 

Although he himself has no modesty, Romundr has afforded Kollgata hers – nailing a moose hide by two hooves to the ceiling for her privacy, creating a corner in which she sleeps.  And dresses.

 

And apparently mixes up strange concoctions.

 

Wordlessly he watches, as she drops cross-legged onto the bearskin rug and pulls off her tattered fur boots.  There is a moment of resistance that brings a wince to her face, then her feet are free.  By the light of the hearthfire, she gently applies the salve to heels and soles blood dark with abrasions old and new.

 

Joining her on the floor, Romundr reaches for the medicament and brings it to his nose, triggering mental notes of sweet and savory, and faint memories of green.  Kollgata waits impatiently for him to relinquish the container so she might scoop up another palmful to rub into her skin.

 

“That must hurt,” comments Romundr as he passes the bowl, admiring of her stoicism.    Kollgata slides him a look of pure sarcasm, then turns to tending her feet. 

 

“It was a long march to get here,” she reminds him.  “My shoes needed replacing even before your raiders came to my camp.” 

 

Carefully, she wipes her fingers on a filthy cloth she has found somewhere.  “If you can locate me a bit of reindeer hide, I will make a new pair,” she suggests, then adds disingenuously, “I would need to have my knife back.”

 

“Do you think me a fool?” queries Romundr, his face in a place between amusement and amazement.  “I have no intention of putting a blade in your hands.  You would use it to cut my throat while I slept.”

 

“You would snap my neck before I finished the task,” Kollgata counters sorrowfully.

 

Romundr ignores this, though he smiles inwardly, wondering precisely where the sadness lies in her statement.  Outwardly, he takes up her footwear, flipping them over to show bottoms worn through.

 

“These are no good here,” he declares with authority.  The one piece skin-soled shoes will have served on the snows and  the rust-coloured grasslands, but here on the rocky coastline surrounding Hafnarfjall, they are inadequate.  Another such pair would be short-lived.

 

“Well, they are all I have,” replies Kollgata crossly, reaching for the only coverings she has for her cold toes.

 

But Romundr playfully pulls one onto his hand, turning it into a puppet, with the pointy toe serving as a down-turned nose.

 

“Well, they are all I have,” he mocks her with the waggling shoe, his voice high.

 

Despite her better instincts Kollgata giggles, and Romundr returns her belongings, feeling well pleased with himself.

 

“That is the first time you have smiled for me,” he tells her, capturing her gaze for a moment before she blinks and turns away.

 

As Kollgata drags her ragged shoes onto her cut and bruised feet, she thoughtfully fingers the metal coil that rest upon and rubs her ankle bone every day.

 

“You are a strange thrall-master, Romundr Roarrson.”

 

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As can probably be inferred from context, the 'ting' was a Viking legislative system of adjudging criminals and settling disputes.


	5. Chapter 5

Heedless of the cold puddles pocking the ground, two large, well-protected feet stomp purposely through the settlement, until they stop at the leather man’s stall.  A deal is struck, a barter is made, a hammered armband changes hands.

 

Elsewhere on that foggy grey morning, Kollgata huddles under a fur cloak, stirring a wooden paddle through a vat of soured goats’ milk.  Although a low fire smoulders under the copper cauldron, it is still bone-chilling in the dairy house.

 

Nearby, the slave girl known as Amina is struggling to roll the fresh curds within lengths of muslin, squeezing out the whey with shivering hands.  She has no wool or fur to keep her warm, nor is her southern blood accustomed to the damp autumn air.

 

Seeing Amina’s hunched shoulders, Kollgata feels a brief pang of pity for the girl, but she resolutely pushes it away.  There may have been a time when she would have offered the other woman one of her garments, but those days are past.  Now her life is a matter of survival -- the future uncertain, the present precarious, the past lost.

 

Amina sneezes violently, wiping her dripping nose on the cotton of her sleeve.  The sound starts Kollgata out of her reverie.

 

“Does not your keeper provide warmer clothes for you?” she asks in curiosity.  The summer tunic dress and apron are all she has ever seen Amina wear.

 

“I have no keeper,” replies Amina, pausing to gather her words.  In the past weeks, she has learned much of the Northmen’s language, but she must still think before she speaks.

 

“No one household.  Just…”  She makes a vague and grand gesture, encompassing the entire community. 

 

Puckering her brow, Kollgata considers this information.  She had not realized that some of their number were in thrall to the eorl at large.

 

“Where do you sleep?” she asks in practicality after a moment.

 

“Under the grass roof.  By the big house.”  Amina draws a square with her graceful hands, then points towards the base of the mountain.

 

Kollgata nods.  The sod-covered lodge next to the Great Hall.  She had assumed it was part of the eorl’s storage holdings.

 

“Sometimes not enough blankets,” volunteers Amina, stifling another sneeze.  “Or cloaks.  The stronger women take them.”

 

“It would be better if you found a keeper, a protector,” Kollgata advises the other woman brusquely, as she slides off her bench.  “Here.  Trade places with me.” 

 

She stands, holding the stirring oar still.  “It is warmer by the kettle.”

 

********************

 

With glassy eyes and a stem of dill protruding from each gaping mouth, two fine fat herring sputter and sizzle over the cooking fire.  Kollgata, her arms aching from fatigue, holds the long metal handles of the hinged vise that traps the fish flat and suspends them in the heat, while the oil from their flesh drips into the flames.  When the skin begins to blister, she removes the iron tongs and opens dinner onto an oval plate.  This she sets on the low table beside which Romundr reclines, waiting for his meal and quaffing ale.

 

Kollgata turns away, intending to leave him to consume his fill before she sups, but he admonishes her gruffly.

 

“Sit.  Eat.”

 

He is already feasting straight from the platter, spilling flakes of food on his tunic.  Obediently, Kollgata drops into place opposite, forking a bit of the seasoned fish onto her plate.  The dillweed tempers the strong marine flavor and she eats hungrily.

 

Watching her, Romundr palms a pair of apples from the bowl in the table’s center and offers her one.  Kollgata accepts, eyeing the wormhole-riddled round pointedly.

 

“If I had my knife, I could clean this.”

 

Romundr’s only response is a chuckle and an eyeroll.  Pulling his own blade from his belt, he deftly peels and quarters enough fruit for both of them. 

 

After a moment, Kollgata vents a sudden grunt past the mealy morsels of apple in her mouth.  From her apron pocket she produces a lumpy wad wrapped in thin cloth.

 

“My share from today’s work.”

 

Wordlessly, Romundr unrolls the dry brown curds.  This is not an exercise in discovery – his nose has already told him what she has brought.

 

“Were you given this, or did you take it?” he asks curiously.  He would wager the latter; thralls are not normally rewarded.

 

Kollgata merely shrugs away his question, taking that opportunity to jump up and serve more ale.

 

“Gamalost.”  Romundr names the acrid cheese, popping some past his lips.  “Have you tried it?”

 

“The smell was enough to ward me off,” Kollgata says with a face of distaste.

 

Romundr laughs from deep within his belly.  “You might learn to like it,” he suggests with a wink.  “It is said to enhance love-making.”

 

Suddenly sorry she skimmed a bit from the vat to bring home, Kollgata hastily busies herself with the cleanup, while Romundr wanders out into the starry darkness.  When he returns, he drops something loudly onto the table and stands by until she swivels to investigate.

 

Kollgata’s eyes alight upon two matched dark brown objects, so incongruous in their appearance before her, it takes her a moment to understand.  When she does, high colour flushes her wide cheekbones, and she must strive to hide her delight.

 

There within reach is a new pair of boots – made of smooth thick leather, with sturdy soles and long supple straps to lace up the ankle.  Across the arch is a flap closure, secured with a knot of bone and a loop.  It is of the style of footwear she has seen the Northmen wear, and this pair is clearly too small for the one who stands expectantly awaiting her reaction.

 

Tentatively, Kollagta lifts one boot and measures the footbed against her sole.  It is a near perfect match.

 

“How did you…” she begins, even as Romundr lines the other shoe up along his palm with a self-satisfied nod.  She never finishes the question, remembering his game of hand puppetry. 

 

After a contemplative moment, she voices another query.  “Why are you so kind to me?”  This Northman is nothing like she expected, not at all what she feared.  Nevertheless, she must maintain her guard.

 

For Romundr, the only reply that comes to his tongue is an allegory.

 

“The kestrel is caught by the snare, but kept by the sweet meats.”

 

“Am I a kestrel?” Kollgata challenges evenly, eyes snapping.

 

Romundr takes in her defiant stance and nods.

 

“Small.  And beautiful.  And deadly.”

 

“And shackled by the leg,” shoots back Kollgata bitterly.

 

A mask of annoyance hardens Romundr’s features.  “Your life here could be much worse,” he reminds her with a shrug of indifference.  “Or you could be dead back in your camp.”

 

“You expect gratitude?”  She stares at him incredulously, and they lock eyes for a long impasse.  The only sound in their ears is the crackling of the fire and the beating of their own hearts.

 

Finally, Kollgata breaks away.  “ _Tak_ for the shoes,” she says quietly, before disappearing into her personal space with her gift.

 

For a split second, Romundr’s frustration almost gets the better of him, but he resists the urge to follow her.  Instead he settles down in front of the hearth to finish off the ale and ponder the flames, his thoughts as twisted as his father’s ring on his finger as he absently worries it. 

 

_Why must this relationship be so abrasive?  What is the key to unlocking her goodwill?  Why does he care?_

 

Somewhere in the far reaches of his mind, Romundr hears a faint cackling.

 

Or perhaps it is just a trick of the fire.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Gamalost translates literally to "old cheese", and dates back to Viking times, when it was used to "enhance sexual prowess." The cheese, whose odor has been described as reminiscent of an old sock, could be stored for long periods without refrigeration.


	6. Chapter 6

Njord, God of Wind and Sea and Fire, puffs his mighty cheeks and sends a salty breeze across the fjord-side homestead.  It dries the pitch on the hull of the longboat in drydock; it rustles the tattered edges of the sails in their lashings; it tickles the blades of grass on the sod-roofed abode.

 

Raising his voice to be heard over the wind, Romundr calls out a greeting and raps on the lintel.

 

“Velkommen.”

 

Birgit looks up with a smile, her hands buried in a bowl of coarse dough.  Like her mate Ginnar, Birgit is kissed by fire, tawny-haired, with a spray of freckles dotting her round cheeks.

 

“How goes your day?” inquires Romundr breezily, sliding his eye over the scene.  Laid out on the work table are the limp carcasses of four plump, ground-dwelling birds.  On the floor, the female Sami children are gamely putting their small fingers to work plucking two more flyers inside a burlap tote, managing to leave more feathers outside the sack than in it.  One of the girls watches Romundr shyly but carefully, her dark eyes never leaving his face.

 

“Uff da!” says Birgit, laughing when she sees the mess they are making.  “Why don’t you do that outside?”  She points to the door, beaming indulgently.

 

The one child takes the gamesack and her hen and heads for the exit.  The other, the observant one, is still fascinated by Romundr.

 

Hiding a grin, Romundr takes the tip of his braid and holds it under his nose like a bristly moustache.  Then, with an eyebrow wiggle, he bursts into a nonsense song, sending both girls giggling from the house.

 

The curious girl child lingers at the door to look back at him, reminding him somehow of Kollgata. 

 

_Could this little one be her daughter?_

 

The thought is startling, inconvenient, and he seeks to discard it as quickly as it came.  He could certainly believe Kollgata capable of such deception, but he doubts a child this young could maintain such a secret.  Or could they?  Well he knows, the dark depths of silence a frightened youngling might plumb.  Or a youth.

 

When he turns back to Birgit, she is patting a layer of meal into a large tin.  “As you can see, we were at the bog and bagged some quail.”

 

“You will dine well tonight,” comments Romundr.  “Do they eat much?”

 

“The Finna whelps?”  Birgit’s features soften into a mask of maternal concern.  “I am trying to put a little fat on them.  They are so thin.”

 

“Where are the boys?”  Romundr realizes belatedly that he has seen nothing of the male members of the household.

 

“With Ginnar on the ropewalk.”

 

******************

 

From a large tub of water, a wet strand of plant fiber spools out slowly, disappearing into the distance.  Two small figures are guiding the threads which are hooked to a cogwheel, back and forth along a quarter mile path.  At intervals, the lengths pass through tri-partite supports to keep them separate.  The strands will be wound together by means of a crank-wheeled gear mechanism, creating the hemp cordage so indispensable to the sea-faring Northmen.

 

Ginnar sits on the ground within sight of the ropewalk, coils of completed cable all around him.  Two cauldrons are near at hand, one full of heat, the other cool to the touch.  Methodically, he teases out the frayed terminals of each rope length, searing the ends in fire, then dipping them into the pot of pitch.

 

At the crunching sound of approaching footfalls, he turns, alert.  Quickly he fires a spare twining spindle at the advancing man as distraction, while diving at his midsection.  Ginnar and Romundr roll heavily to the ground, each grappling for an incapacitating hold, twisting for weight advantage, seeking the nerve-numbing grip.  Though Ginnar is the heavier, Romundr is tenacious and equally strong.

 

Unnoticed, the boys draw near on their return pass and halt, watching the scuffle with wide eyes.  Eventually the two men fall apart, laughing, backs to the dirt, faces to the sky.

That is when the second surprise attack comes.

 

“Oaf!” grunts Romundr, as the more bold of the boys dives on him and begins pummeling this head with his scrawny fists.

 

Pushing himself hastily to his feet, Ginnar hauls the still-flailing lad off by his collar.

 

‘Do not worry, boys!” he says stridently, seeking to diffuse the misunderstanding.  “It is only a game we play.”  With a stern shake, he deposits the feisty child on his feet, ruffling his hair to take the sting out of the moment.  “Now run back home.  You are finished for the day.”

 

The boy hanging back does not need to be told twice.  Giving Romundr a wide berth, he speeds off without waiting for his partner.  The second boy hesitates in confusion, picking nervously at the scabs on his palms, until Romundr feints menacingly in his direction.  Then he too finds his feet.

 

“Their soft Finna fingers are unused to the ropemaker’s work,” observes Romundr, having had a close look at hands scratched and bloody from paying out miles of hemp fiber.

 

Ginnar busies himself pouring water into the hot cauldron, sending up a hiss of steam.  He remembers his own youth learning the skill of boat making – the sore muscles, the splinters, the bruises, the consequences of a careless slip of the axe.

 

“By the next full moon, they will be strong and calloused,” he declares, as he drapes a heavy circle of finished rope over each shoulder.  He claps his friend on the bicep.  “Stay and share our meal.  Birgit is making quail pie.”

 

“There will not be enough.”  Romundr knows the big man has the appetite of a giant.

 

“True.  But you can watch us eat,” Ginnar suggests with a teasing grin.  “I have something to share with you after.”

 

******************

 

Undulating ribbons of green-blue light dance across the moonless sky, as bright as any flame against the dense darkness.  Reaching out from the heavens to embrace the horizon, the celestial bands paint living patterns in shimmering shades of fern and sea-foam – ever-changing, always mesmerizing.

 

Faces to the sky, Ginnar and Romundr sit wrapped in furs at the end of a pier, watching the luminescent show above.  It is a sure sign of impending winter when the _Nordlys_ return, and Romundr welcomes them.  There are multiple fanciful theories about the source of the wildfire in the sky, but the one he favors credits reflections bouncing off the armour of the spirit maidens bringing the chosen to Valhalla.

 

“The Valkyrie are abroad in great number this night,” he huffs out into the cold air.  Almost he wishes to extinguish the torches that flank them, to better enjoy the wondrous illumination, but he knows the beacons are a guide and a caution to returning sailors.

 

“As will we be soon,” replies Ginnar, referring to the upcoming raids.  “But first…”  With a wink, he pulls two staghorn pipes from within his cloak, along with a leather pouch.

 

Romundr’s countenance brightens in pleasant surprise.

 

“You have some left?  Mine is long gone.”  The Byzantine trader who passed through in the spring had done a brisk business bartering the fabled _tabak_ from his land.

 

“And something more,” gloats Ginnar with a gleam in his eye.  Romundr can only wonder at his meaning.  Many a Northman would pay dearly for a fresh taste of the Anatolian leaf.  What more can there be?

 

“This is a mixture,” elaborates the shipwright, as he carefully fills the bowls.  “The last load of hemp, though dry, was not well cleaned – many leaves.”  He hands a pipe to Romundr, stem first.  “One day I grew curious.”

 

Snapping a loose splinter from the dock, Ginnar steals a bit of fire from the base of a torch to bring his pipe to life, then passes the tinder to Romundr.

 

Both men pull in deep draughts, with Romundr clearing this throat surreptitiously when the bite hits his airways.  He can feel his lungs expanding, more than he is accustomed to.  The sensation is like the rush of the sea wind when it fills his chest, bringing with it dreams of adventure and possibility.

 

The companions inhale in silence for a time.  This mixture provides a harsh smoking experience, but soon leaves a mellow mood as reward.  Ginnar rocks softly from side to side, humming tunelessly into his beard.  In the course of their expansive journey, Romundr’s thoughts eventually pause to dwell on the past hours under his friend’s roof, and the lively chaos he observed there.

 

“Birgit seems happy with her new brood.  If a bit overwhelmed at times.”  He chuckles, thinking of the round up efforts required to corral four youngsters at bedtime.

 

Ginnar exhales thoughtfully.  “It is not the same as having my own sons,” he says.  “Yet I would give anything for Gita’s happiness.  She always wanted children.”  

 

Romundr cannot resist the urge to mock the obvious.  “No one will ever take them as yours.  Not a red hair on their heads.”

 

Ginnar allows a small smile to lurk at the corners of his mouth, but is otherwise too introspective to pay mind to the jest.

 

Upon Ginnar’s silence, Romundr turns to eye his friend with fresh compassion.  “The day may yet come when the gods send you a birth son.  And Birgit is a good woman.  You are fortunate.”

 

Ginnar nods -- the love he bears for his freckle-faced mate is great.  “I am fortunate indeed.”

 

After a moment, the shipbuilder remarks obliquely, never taking his eyes from the sky, “Your fortunes have improved, yes?  A wench to warm your loins whenever you will.”  He has known Roarsson for a dozen years, yet the man has always been far too particular about his female companionship.

 

Before he realizes it, the strange hemp herb has loosed Romundr’s tongue.  “She does not share my bed.”

 

Ginnar is non-plussed.  “Even if she does not appeal, it is a soft spot of a night.”

 

“Oh, she appeals,” admits Romundr ruefully.  “A bit too much – that is the issue.”  Dropping his eyelids, he breathes deeply of the crisp autumn air, watching the vision playing in his mind.

 

“She has a fire, a dignity to her,” Romundr says softly.  “I do not wish to quench that.”

 

“What is your plan then?”  Ginnar is sure it must be the pipeweed talking.  This poetic Romundr is no one he knows.

 

Opening his eyes, Romundr sighs.  “I would have her come to me willingly.”

 

Ginnar snorts.  “You killed her people and stole her from her life.  Why should she open her legs for you?”

 

“I killed none of her people,” counters Romundr.

 

“That day,” retorts Ginnar.  “We have shed Finna blood before.”

 

“We sent them to their gods.”

 

“And I am sure they are eternally grateful.”  Ginnar’s sly sarcasm sends them both into a fit of laughter.

 

Choosing that moment to make his farewell, Romundr hauls himself to his feet and surrenders the pipe.

 

“I thank you for your hospitality.  Such as it was,” he adds, feigning a martyr’s air.  “My stomach is still half-empty.  And I am suddenly as ravenous as a bear in springtime!”

 

A short stroll through the peaceful compound brings Romundr to his own door.  He enters hopefully and not particularly noiselessly.  But the room is empty and quiet, save for the soft snoring that comes from behind Kollgata’s curtain.  The sound is soothing to his ears, comforting to his spirit.

 

In the dim light given off by the hearth, he spies a turkey leg, now surely cold, on a plate on the table.  He devours it gratefully, at the same time shrugging out of his boots and overclothes.  When his teeth and tongue have found every last morsel, he tosses the bone into the fire and stokes the flames, before finding his bed and falling atop it, mind racing.

His eyes drift only once to Kollgata’s corner. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Anyone who wants to, can Google ropemaking in ancient times. I have probably spent too much time already describing it here.
> 
> Also, I know that sources will tell you that smoking hemp will not get you high. But I can tell you, having filled my lungs with a mixture of Turkish tobacco and dried hemp, it was harsh, but there was an effect.


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> According to my shallow research, Hafnarfjall means "mountain of the one with a cheek wound"

In the Halls of the Heavens Thor strikes his hammer, and thunder rules the dark skies.  Down below, in the Halls of Men, a thundering war cry rises in answer to the Storm God.  Upon the mountaintop Odin brandishes his spear, and a jagged bolt of lightning illuminates the massif and the sprawling Great House it shelters, throwing into silhouette the carved heads that cross at the building’s peak. 

 

Sheets of rain sluice down the steeply pitched rooves of Hafnar’s meeting hall.  The wind rattles the rust-coloured leaves on the venerable ash tree that canopies the doorway.  The stone staircase leading to the portal is wet, and slick with fallen vegetation, yet this poses no hazard.  The people of Hafnarfjall are already inside the eorl’s lodge, celebrating the eve of the autumn raid.

 

In the center of the floor, a fat ox turns on a spit, not the first to be roasted that day.  Lining the walls are long tables, laden with breads and baked turnip dishes, pitchers of ale and flagons of honey wine.  The odor of charred meat and spilled drink and overheated bodies fills the air. 

 

Side by side, Eorl Hafnar sits with his lady at the far end of the elongated room, surveying his feasting subjects from a tiered dais.  He has spent all his words exhorting his warriors to glory and adventure, and now sips mead from a golden chalice, courtesy of some dead monk on a far-away shore.  Catching the eye of one of the many serving thralls, he motions for a refill. 

 

Kollgata approaches tentatively, trying not to stare.  This is the first time she has seen the chieftain up close.  His nose is like the beak of a hawk, his eyes, just as sharp.  His hair is shot through with the grey of the winter goose.  Half his head is shaved, the half that proudly reveals the birthmark resembling a cheek wound, the mark that gives him his name.  He ignores her as she pours.

 

“You!  Finna wench!  More drink!”  Nearby, Rothergus pounds his mug on a tabletop, sending the empty plates spinning.

 

Amidst the raucous din of the celebrants, Kollgata pretends not to hear him.  He has been leering at her all evening.  Every time she turns, she finds his eyes on her.

 

But he is not to be ignored.  Lumbering to his feet and leaning threateningly across the table, Rothergus shouts again.

 

“You hear me?  I need more ale!”

 

Grabbing a pitcher from the trestle, Kollgata carelessly sloshes some brown liquid into his pewter, managing to spill some on his sleeve.

 

“You’re a clumsy one,” Rothergus sneers, grabbing her wrist.  “I should have killed you along with the rest of your ugly womenfolk.”

 

Kollgata’s obsidian eyes bore into his, oozing hatred, but her mouth is silent.  From the corner of her vision, she locates a dagger beside the next man’s plate.  The blade would look glorious plunged into Rothergus’ face.  And it will be, she vows, if he attempts to assault her.

 

Instead he laughs, giving her a powerful shove that sends her roughly to the floorboards.  The jeers of Rothergus and his companions follow her, as she rights herself and strides, straight-backed and dignified, to the opposite wall of revelers.

 

Here she finds voices raised heartily in song.

 

As she moves along the banquet board, clearing empty plates and righting spilled cups, one deep baritone stands out to her ear.  In the corner shadows, she finally finds the source.

 

Romundr, a narrow mask of kohl painted from temple to temple, a drinking horn in hand, sits with a serving thrall on each knee.  He is drunk on dirges to his gods, intoxicated with mead and battle might.

 

And no doubt lust.

 

Kollgata turns away before she is noticed.  The night bodes ill.  This is a Romundr she has never seen.

 

Perhaps it is a Romundr she does not wish to see.

 

******************

 

Throat and head still humming with wine and song, Romundr makes his unsteady way home, sloshing through puddles.  The clouds have lifted, the moon has shown his face, the gods have gone to their beds.  And now he wishes to do the same.

 

He stops to relieve himself at the corner of the hut, then lets himself inside.  But the room is too quiet, too cold.  The fire is long gone.  There is only silence from behind the moosehide.

 

“Kollgata?” 

 

He speaks her name as he stirs the hearth to life.  No weary sarcasm greets his query.  After a perplexed moment, he lights a candle and pokes his head behind the shaggy curtain.

 

The pile of furs and blankets he has provided for her sleeping is empty.  Idly, he places a hand – cold.  She has not returned from the Great Hall.

 

Overcome by curiosity and the intimacy of being in her space, Romundr holds the candle higher to have a look around.  He sees a change of clothes tossed beside the bed.  Her battered Sami slippers are lined up carelessly against the wall.  A half-eaten bowl of porridge from the morning sits on the floor, well-congealed by now.

 

And there is the wooden box she brought with her from her old life.

 

Without a moment of thought or inhibition, Romundr takes it in hand, fumbling until he finds the hidden slide.  Within are all the personal treasures that define this woman.

 

He snoops eagerly, fingering each item, cataloguing in his mind:  various small pouches of dried leaves and berries, thin leather thongs to tie hair, a comb made of bone, a creamy white lump which he brings to his nose. 

 

The unmistakable scent of horse chestnut – soap.  He has taken note of the fragrance before, whenever she passes close.

 

When he is finished, Romundr makes no particular effort to put things back the way he found them, though he does re-attach the lid.  Returning to the main room, he warms himself before the fire, as thoughts swim around in his head.

 

_Where is she?_

_She did not return from the feast._

_Why isn’t she here?_

_She belongs here._

Annoyance and rising concern swirl up together until, with a frustrated growl, he storms back out into the night.

 

 

 


	8. Chapter 8

The Great Hall is finally silent, except for the snores of those who never made it home before the drink took over.  Romundr travels the lengths of the tables, stopping to throw back a left-over swallow of mead here and there, searching the prone forms but not finding the familiar shape he seeks.

 

“More wine, sire?” 

 

A bent-backed older woman rushes up from the direction of the kitchens.

 

Romundr ignores the flagon in her hands.  “The Finna slave?  Where is she?”  He looks expectantly towards the cooking wing.

 

“I am the only one still here,” the thrall says.  “All the girls went to their beds.”

 

“Where?”  A storm cloud to rival anything called up by Thor crosses Romundr’s countenance.

 

“In the long house.”  She points a finger timidly over his shoulder.

 

Swiveling so quickly it makes his head spin, Romundr continues his search, heading for the nearest outbuilding.  He bursts through the door of the female slave quarters, causing audible alarm amongst the population, many in varying stages of undress.  

 

But Romundr has eyes for only one.

 

“Kollgata!” he bellows, sweeping his vision over the startled faces.  “Kollgata!”

 

His tongue slips, revealing the nickname he has for her in his mind.  “Kolli!”

 

Two women rise from where they have been crouching, clinging to each other – Amina and her Finna friend.

 

Triumphant, Romundr pushes his way to them, grabbing Kollgata by the upper arm, dragging her outside.

 

“What do you think you are doing?”  He releases her with a shake, glowering at her in the moonlight.

 

Kollgata does not answer, caught up instead in wondering whether he brought two or only one of the slave girls home with him.  Either way, the sight of Romundr taking pleasure with another woman is not something she wishes to witness.

 

Into the silence, Romundr voices a second challenge.  “You thought you would sleep with the common slaves?”

  
“I thought you would bring the two women from the feast hall,” Kollgata says crossly.  “I was going to make my bed here.”

 

“You know where your bed is.”  If he were not so reckless with drink, he would break eye contact when he says this.

 

“And what of those women?”  Kollgata returns his look suspiciously. 

 

“What of them?” snaps Romundr.  “I don’t want any women right now…”  _Not entirely true…_

“Because you are already spent?” suggests Kollgata in a wry tone, striding out ahead of him, the subject closed as far as she is concerned.

 

“What? No!” 

 

Romundr hurries to catch up with her in the darkness, bringing with him an admonition.  “You should not be out alone like this, at night.  Rothergus still has his sight on you.”

 

Kollgata grimaces in silent agreement, then slides a calculating eye in his direction.

 

“If you gave me back my knife, I could defend myself.”

 

It is a weary refrain, almost a nagging game between them, but this time, Romundr considers it.  Coming to a halt under the torch that lights the leathermonger’s stall, he pulls her skinner’s blade from a pocket.

 

“You won’t open my throat while I sleep?”

 

Holding her breath, Kollgata shakes her head gravely.  “No – I promise.”

 

After a charged moment, Romundr presents it to her on the flat of his palm.  The knife is dwarfed there against his flesh, as is Kollgata’s hand when she brushes her fingers across his in the act of reclamation.

 

Smiling slightly, Kollgata hefts the handle like the handclasp of an old friend, twisting the metal edge in the air with familiar dexterity – a skill that Romundr finds both seductive and disconcerting.

 

“Here.  You need a proper belt,” he declares suddenly.  “You have no sheath.”  Peering around the displayed wares, he pulls down a narrow length from an overhead hook. 

 

Taken aback, Kollgata raises her voice in protest.  “What are you doing?  That belongs to – ”

 

“You.  It belongs to you now,”   Romumdr cuts her off.  He will come and pay the man on the morrow.

 

Fully within his liberties, Romundr removes her Sami belt, draping it across his neck to free his hands, as he cinches Kollgata’s waist with the new leather.  She examines the workmanship, appreciating the thickness and weight, before pushing her knife into its slot and securing it with a loop.  Meanwhile, Romundr lends his own curiosity to her traditional waist wrap, now hanging down his chest.

 

“So ornate,” he comments.  “What mean all these buttons?  They serve no use.”  He gives a derisive flick of the fingers to the row of artifacts that decorates his pectorals.

 

“They indicate standing in our culture.”

 

“Standing?”  Romundr looks up, startled.  “Are you important?”

 

Kollgata compresses her lips, as though trying to trap a truth that refuses to stay where it belongs.

 

“Square buttons for the married,” she says finally.

 

Romundr fingers the round pewter discs.  “Unmarried?”

 

Kollgata nods, reluctantly.

 

Face darkening in anger, Romundr spits on the ground.  “Are all your Finna men blind?  Worthless in war, worthless in love.”

 

Kollgata must hide a smile before replying.  “I had a man…once.  He died of a fever.  Now he hunts the great fields of _saivo,_ where game is plentiful and life is easy.”

 

This reference to the Sami afterlife is intriguing.  Not an unpleasant vision of eternity, but bucolic compared to the warrior’s version to which Romundr aspires.

 

A thought returns to him as they continue through the rows of craftsmen’s stalls.

 

“Sons?  Daughters?”  He must ask it.  “Are any of the children we brought away –”

 

Kollgata interrupts him with a shake of her head.  “I did not wish a child.”

 

“You make this decision for yourself.”  Romundr is skeptical.  Any Northwoman not serving as shieldmaiden is exhorted, exalted, to bring more warriors into the world.

 

Kollgata’s voice is cold with pragmatism.  “A child would be my burden to care for, therefore my choice to make.”  Her heart pinches with dark memories.  “We moved from place to place, often with barely enough food for ourselves.  Why would I want to bring a child into that life?”

 

Frowning, Romundr considers this.  “Your ways are strange.  Our sons are how we live on after we go to Valhalla.”

 

“Where are yours then?” Kollgata cuts back boldly, a bit annoyed with herself for having shared too much of her story with him.

 

“When the gods reveal their mother to me, there will be sons,” Romundr blusters, puffing out his chest with air.

“You hope.”

 

“I know.”

 

Suddenly, Romundr’s head begins to swim and he staggers against a nearby upright, nearly bringing it down.  Gathered rainwater tips out of the awning, drenching his crown, leaving him spluttering but no more sober.

 

“Now who needs to find their bed?”  Kollgata laughs, supporting him around the waist.  To see him like this calls up in her a nurturing instinct she thought lost.  Patiently, she leads him the last distance home.

 

“Come.  You will be making no sons this night.” 

 

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The symbolic elements of Sami dress are real in this chapter, as is the idea of the afterlife named saivo.


	9. Chapter 9

“Did he beat you?”

 

Aflame with curiosity, Amina sidles up to Kollgata, as they and so many others work busily at first light, to load the graceful longboats for their journey.

 

“What?”  Kollgata whips around is surprise.  “No! He would never!”  She shakes her head – disturbed by the question, surprised by her answer – realizing for the first time the trust in her heart.

 

Quickening her steps in confusion, she hurries along the pier with a rolled blanket yoked across her shoulders.

 

“He was angry,” recalls the slave girl who has seen too much of the rage of men.

 

“He was heady with mead.  And he found himself alone.”  The truth passes Kollgata’s lips before she can consider what it suggests.

 

The girl from southern shores nods sagely.  “Did he fuck you then?”   Amina’s mastery of the Northern tongue has vastly improved, and with it her ability to negotiate her circumstances.  She spends fewer nights as a bed slave, and more days as a child care giver.

 

“Was he rough?” she persists, shifting the basket on her hip to move closer, lest she miss any details.

 

“What do you think?” replies Kollgata after a flustered pause, her cheeks flushing at the not entirely unpleasant thought of some rigorous love-making with her raven-emblazoned master.

 

“I think you could do worst.”

 

Amina’s malapropism of the saying only serves to highlight her conviction.  She has in mind some of the loathsome and cruel specimens of manhood who have commanded her favors.

 

“He said the same thing in a way,” murmurs Kollgata almost to herself, as she watches Romundr up ahead, single-handedly stacking barrels as wide as his chest.  The strength required is written in his face, now contorted with exertion.

 

All around, the bustle of preparation is coming to a climax.  Shouted instructions fill the air; excited calls of parting echo back and forth.  Small fleets of heavily laden rowboats depart the docks for the great ships berthed farther out, ferrying supplies, only to return light in the water and ready for another load.  The longboats ride high and proud on the swells, their striped sails unfurled, their oars locked, their gunwales lined with shields.

 

Sensing the impending finality, Kollgata hastens to overtake Romundr’s position.  He glances down at her sudden appearance beside him.

 

“Safe journey.”  Her words are quiet, simple in the telling, telling in their sincerity.

 

Caught halfway through the act of hefting another cask, Romundr sets it back down with a grunt.  “I will if you send me off with a smile.”

 

Kollgata meets his eyes and her lips curve --in farewell, in blessing, in awakening.

 

Heart suddenly light, Romundr returns her unspoken promise with an answering flash of teeth, and takes the burden from her back.

 

All too soon, the last of the provisions are stowed.  The warriors pile into the transport skiffs with much laughter, eager to be off, faces to the horizon.

 

None look back – save one.

 

As the rising sun clears the mountain’s shoulder, the Ancient Mother is borne on a litter to the water’s edge by four strong-backed male thralls.  To the throbbing of a drum, she sacrifices a goat while intoning Freya’s blessing to all warriors.

 

_Unharmed go forth,_

_Unharmed return,_

_Unharmed back home._

The mighty vessels turn their sheets to the wind and their fearsomely carved prows to the open water, while the blood shed in offering leaves on the retreating tide to follow the longboats to sea.

 

Left behind is a shoreline dotted with women and children and elders, including the family of the fleet’s builder.  Birgit and the girls wave until the ships have cleared the headland; meanwhile the boys channel their boredom and energy into a shoving match.  When Amina instinctively steps in to separate them, her help is received gratefully by their mistress.  More grateful still is Amina, to be beckoned back to that household.  They join the stream of people meandering inland.

 

Last to leave is the lone figure with the dark hair whipping about her face, standing stoically at the edge of the pier long after the harbor is empty.

 

***********************

 

The air is damp with fog; the world is covered in hoarfrost.  The mighty ash beside the Great Hall has given up the last of its leaves weeks ago, and now reaches bare limbs into the mist.  An eerie silence hangs over the settlement, the hush of waiting, waiting for the eorl and his warriors to return.

 

Inside the eorl’s walls, there is much rejoicing.  The sea gods have sent Hafnarfjall a fine gift – a short distance up the coast, the carcass of a whale has washed ashore.  Everyone, thralls and free-folk alike, must work together to harvest the marine behemoth before it rots or the waters reclaim it.  Flesh and bone and blubber – all parts will be used, and there will be oil for lamps as well as for trading.

 

By day’s end, all that remains of the giant humpback is the curved cathedral of its ribcage.  Weary workers, long since beyond the point of idle chatter, break off their labours in silence when the light begins to leave the sky.

 

Kollgata has spent her hours in the crew rendering fat into oil, until her very pores are seeping with it.  As she plods towards home, her temples pounding with fatigue, she encounters a familiar face pushing a wheelbarrow.

 

“Amina!” she exclaims.  “I have not seen you in some time.”  The southern girl looks small beside her burden --  a three-pronged vertebrae destined to become tools for sailmaking.

 

Thankful for a reason to drop the handles of her heavy load, Amina turns to her friend.  “I have a new roof over my head,” she imparts shyly.  “I help to look after the youngsters who came here with you.”

 

“This is good news!”  Impulsively, Kollgata throws her arms around the other woman, only to back away quickly.  “Apologies.  I smell of this labour,” she says with a rueful grimace.

 

“We both do,” Amina assures her.  She seems to give consideration to an idea, then gives it voice.  “Come to the boatmaker’s hut tonight.  Later, after the children are in bed.”

 

“Why?”

 

“It is Saturday, the day of bathing.”  Amina knows the Northmen’s routines well now.  “After the family washes, I am free to use the bath.”

 

The offer is exceedingly appealing.  Kollgata hugs herself, imagining going to sleep clean, instead of smelling like a fish.  She has only a cold wash basin awaiting her.  But she shakes her head sadly.

 

“I would not be welcome.”

 

Amina grins, pleased with her own cleverness.  “I will tell the mistress that you come to teach me Finna words.  To help me understand the children.”

 

After a moment of equivocation, Kollgata decides the idea has merit.

 

“I will be there,” she replies conspiratorially.  _“Giitu.”_

Upon Amina’s look of confusion, Kollgata adds, “Your first lesson.  And we call ourselves _Sami_.”

 

**********************

“Dunk your head.”

 

“What is ‘dunk’?” queries Amina, her hair wet with the soap Kollgata has worked in, her brain foggy with all the new words Kollgata has poured in.

 

“Like this,” suggests Kollgata impishly, pushing the southern girl underwater from her crown.  Like an apple, Amina bobs back to the surface, spluttering and laughing, her haphazardly chopped locks plastered to her face.

 

“No more lessons,” she pleads, folding her graceful limbs over the side of the tub and dropping a woolen tunic down her body.  “Your turn.”

 

By now the water is far from pristine and at best tepid, but such is the hierarchy of the bath – adults, children, slaves.  Birgit and the youngsters are all asleep in the loft; the thralls have this time to themselves.

 

Kollgata strips down quickly, leaving her clothes in a pile, and slides gratefully into the copper basin.  While she lathers away the stench of brine and oil, Amina adds a bit more warmth from an urn buried at the edge of the coals.  After dunking her own head, Kollgata leans back against the tub’s edge, luxuriating in the sensations as Amina reciprocates the hairwash. 

 

“Why your hair is still long?” Amina asks curiously, reaching for the soap bar once again.  In truth, she finds her own shorn head much easier to care for than a tangled curtain such as the one she now works through her hands.

 

“I would not let them cut it,” Kollgata murmurs from behind a grim smile and closed eyes.  Amina’s long fingers massage away the dirt and the headache, leaving Kollgata with a feeling of euphoria.

 

“You defied your master?”  Amina is simultaneously admiring and incredulous.

 

“He is kind to me.”  Kollgata sighs, opening her eyes, remembering.  “He tries to make me laugh.”

 

Amina ponders this for some time.  She has known only abuse and cruelty from men her whole life – she has the scars, both inside and out, to remind her.  These gentle hours with another female are the only tenderness she has known in a very long while, and she longs for more.  Yet she senses that Kollgata’s inclinations lie elsewhere.

 

“Do you miss him?”  Amina regards her friend with an innocence that borders on shrewdness, as she rinses her hands below the surface.

 

“That would be madness,” retorts Kollgata with a frown of annoyance.  “He may not return.”

 

And she slips beneath the water, rinsing her scalp, cleansing her mind.

 

***********************

 

The woman awakens as she always does, with her senses alive.  The first calls of the gulls fighting over the refuse in the alley; the grey light of the flat Frisian coast finding the chinks in the walls; the slow drip from the leaky corner of the ceiling; the odor of stale ale and sweaty coupling.  The sticky sensation between her legs.

 

Beside her, the man who has bought his way into her bed this past night sleeps lightly, the raven wings that span his chest rising and falling.

 

She knows his kind, these marauding Northmen.  They come from the frozen lands to plunder the monasteries and churches.  And even though, due to her profession, there is no love lost between her and the priests, it was nevertheless a longboat full of body-painted raiders who burned her family and their farm to the ground, and used her for hours before leaving her for dead.

 

Now is the day of revenge.

 

She slips the knife from beneath her mattress.

 

********************

 

Splitting the silence with a roar, Romundr senses the attack at the last second and twists sideways, sweeping the whore across the room with a fling of his arm.  The blade meant for his gut instead slices into the flesh of his thigh.

 

Breath coming in rage-filled gasps, he leaps from the bed to defend from a second assault.

 

But there is no more danger.

 

The woman lies face down, still against the sharp edge of the stone hearth skirt, a crimson pool forming under her dark-haired head.

 

Romundr regards her dispassionately.  Pity, in a way.  This one had been pretty.  She had reminded him of Kolli.

 

Suddenly aware of the blood running down his leg, Romundr groans in annoyance.  He rips a filthy length of cotton from the bedclothes to staunch the flow, then dresses to return to the ships.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Writings from the time indicate that Vikings set aside Saturday for bathing, and that a communal tub would be shared by the family in order of status. Also, Vikings controlled some coastal towns in Frisia. I imagine the raiders might stop in to blow off some steam before heading home.


	10. Chapter 10

Long and loud, the blare of the warhorn reaches into the harbor, sounded from the watchers on the headland and carried on the inbound breeze.  Every person who makes their home under Hafnar’s mountain halts what they are doing and waits, counting.

 

The first blast perks their ears, draws their eyes to the sea.

 

The second howl traps their breath in their lungs, speeds their blood through their veins.  Is it an attack?

 

The third and final call starts out low, then lengthens into a triumphant crescendo, ending on a note of rampant glory.  As one, the villagers heave a sigh of release and break into excited babble.

 

“Odin be praised!”

 

“The warriors return!”

 

“Count the ships!  Did all survive?”

 

With the wind gods astern, the longboats rapidly fill the horizon, descending upon Hafnarfjall with their candy-striped sails a bit more tattered than when the fleet embarked, yet with all vessels accounted for.  The soul of every Northman sings with pride at the sight.

 

Initially, Kollgata fails to understand the sudden mass exodus around her, but her curiosity pulls her along.  Once she is given to know the meaning of the signal of threes, her steps quicken, bringing her to the docks just as the first _knarr_ is unloading its cargo of homecoming raiders.  Spying the unmistakable ginger-haired bulk of Ginnar, Kollgata rushes forward.

 

But something is amiss.

 

The boatmaker hastily waves off  his own approaching family.  With Ginnar on the pier, two other men from inside the yawing hull feed over the handles of a pallet which bears the still body of a man.

 

That man is Romundr.

 

Romundr, lying pale as death, with his hands crossed over the hilt of the sword laid up his body.  Gently, the weary warriors maneuver the bier-like conveyance onto the planks.

 

Slipping in between them, Kollgata drops to her knees, filling her eyes with his ashen face and lifeless form.  With her throat pinched in trepidation, she lays her palm across his forehead, finding only coolness.  Rubbing sensation into her cheek, she places her skin against his mouth and nose; a faint brush of warmth still stirs and she drops her eyelids in silent thanks to all the gods.  Raising her head, she fingers the collar of his tunic, now clammy and saturated with perspiration.  His breathing is shallow --  until the moment a violent chill wracks his frame.

 

“What happened?”  Kollgata pulls the furs up around Romundr’s ears and braces his shoulders while the tremors play out.

 

“He has a wound,” replies Ginnar, pointing to his own thigh for reference.  “It festers.  A fever fell upon him two days ago.”

 

Something inside Kollgata clenches with fear and determination.  She will not lose another man to such ill humours of the blood.

 

Meanwhile, Ginnar motions and the same two men abruptly hoist the litter from the ground, raising it out of Kollgata’s reach.

 

“Take him to my home.  Birgit will tend him.”

 

“No!”

 

Shoulders squared, arms wide and low in symbolic pushback, Kollgata blocks their way.  The three males share varying degrees of surprise and annoyance, but after a tense moment, Ginnar holds up a palm to stay the litter-bearers.

 

“Explain yourself.”

  
“I know the healing ways.  Birgit does not.  I will care for him.”  Oblivious to Birgit’s hard stare, Kollgata turns her commanding attention to those carrying the burden of the prone Romundr.  “Take him to his own bed.  Stoke the fire and strip him of those wet clothes.”

 

Although Ginnar regards her with skepticism, Kollgata does not back down.  Eventually, the shipwright nods and the procession departs, with Ginnar poised to fall into step behind.  But an urgent hand clutches his sleeve, preventing him from following.

 

Affronted, Ginnar looks down pointedly; however Kollgata, in her single-minded purpose, pays him no mind.

 

“You must take me to the foot of the falls.”

 

Ginnar shrugs her off.  “You know the way.  Why?  What is there?”

 

Kollgata ignores his second question.

 

“We must go by horse,” she says gravely.  “There is no time to be lost.”

 

*****************

 

“ _Boska_.”

 

Kollgata pulls up another tall stalk by its roots, being careful to only select the second year plants, the ones with globular bursts that once were flowers and now bear clusters of tiny yellow fruits and seeds.  The damp soil gives up its bounty readily and she soon has an armload of the precious biennial.

 

Nearby, Ginnar is still ahorse, watching her carefully.  “The Christ-lovers call it Angelika,” he comments over the rush of the waterfall behind him.

 

“What do you call it?”  Kollgata lays her harvest on the ground beside him and follows her footprints back into the forest of wild vegetation.

 

“A weed?”  He knows this is not true, that the Northmen as well use the towering plant for medicinal purposes.  He is testing her.

 

And watching her.  “Why do you not take these closer?”  He motions impatiently, as Kollgata bypasses a green grouping within easy reach.

 

“Those?”  Kollgata turns to see.  “Because those are something else entirely.  Those would kill him.”

 

She plucks another stem, holding the broken base to her nose and inhaling deeply.  Ginnar can smell the sweet aroma even from a distance.

 

“This ‘weed’ is sacred to my people,” Kollgata says so quietly he can barely hear her.

 

Ginnar scowls.  “Romundr does not need your Finna prayers.”

 

“No,” responds Kollgata evenly, as she kneels to tie up her bundle of uprooted herbs.  “He needs the power of _boska_ without and within, to tame the fire in his blood.  Else it consumes him.”

 

She tosses her load over her shoulder, and Ginnar lowers a forearm to help her swing up behind him.

 

“Will he awaken?”  Ginnar cannot imagine the mighty Romundr going to the gods anywhere except on the battlefield.

 

There is a long pause.  Although the play of emotions across Kollgata’s face is hidden from his view, the timbre of her voice when she answers is unmistakable.

 

“By all the skill I have, I will see it done.”

 

Her vow does not fall on disbelieving ears; Ginnar is beginning to understand his friend’s respect for this one.

 

“Keep his blade beside him,” instructs Romundr’s brother-in-arms, as he turns the pony for Hafnarfjall and urges it into a trot.  “He cannot enter Valhalla without his sword.”

 

“He is not going to Valhalla.”

 

“He **_will not_** without his sword,” reiterates Ginnar, voice tight with fatal urgency.

 

Kollgata refuses to consider the possibility.  “He is not going to Valhalla,” she says again, jaw set.

 

She can only hope Romundr’s gods are listening.

 

*****************

  
It is worse than she imagined.

 

Kollgata’s nasal passages clamp shut involuntarily when she unwinds the foul covering from Romundr’s thigh.  Edges hot and angry, the cut layers of flesh are laid open, oozing, festering, giving off the odor of death.  Holding the blood and puss soaked rag by a corner, she consigns it to the fire, and with it, the pestilence it holds.

 

Using her knife to begin the tear, Kollgata rips a fresh strip of cloth from her apron and dips it in a bowl of steaming water.  Gingerly, she cleanses Romundr’s  wound, taking great care of the proximity of his manhood, which one of the men has thoughtfully wrapped in a pale blue linen breechclout.

 

Likewise, the men have made certain Romundr’s steel shares the bed with him; however, his next round of tremors knocks it to the floor.  While a second pot of water comes to a boil, Kollgata wrestles the blade upright and removes the scabbard.  Calling upon all her might, she impales one of the floorboards closest to the sleeping pallet, leaving the sword of the man upright, ready, a sentinel guarding its master.

 

With the aid of a grinding stone, Kollgata next mashes both stalks and roots of _boska_ into a coarse paste.  Sacrificing more of her garment, she prepares a bandage with the sacred mixture twisted into the center.  This she soaks briefly in the scalding liquid before loosely wrapping the weeping gash.

 

Romundr does not waken through any of this, even when the cauterizing poultice meets his open flesh.  Kollgata tries to keep him covered as best she can while she works, but each feverish jolt that wracks him gives speed to her ministrations.

 

When she is finished, she covers him with all the furs and blankets she can find.  She piles the hearth until it is akin to a bonfire.  Yet no matter how many trips she makes to the woodpile, the warmth does not reach him.

 

Romundr’s skin is still cold; his limbs still quake with chills; his pulse is still sluggish.

 

With the flames reflected in the deep pools of her eyes, Kollgata keeps watch over her keeper.  The hours pass, the light fades.  As the temperature outside plummets and night begins to fall, she knows what she must do.

 

Before another bout of shivering overtakes him, Kollgata sheds her clothing and wriggles underneath the heavy pile of coverings.  Pressing her warm body against his clammy skin, she wraps herself around him, until her heat flows into him, until her embrace quiets his twitching muscles, until his heart strengthens to keep pace with hers.

 

 

 

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Boska, or Angelica archangelica, is a sacred, shamanic medicine plant in Sami culture. Many other members of the same family are deadly poisons, such as hemlock.
> 
> The whole concept of a Viking needing a sword to enter Valhalla is a bit simplified here, as it came to be in the Christian re-telling of the Viking era. The highest glory was certainly death on the battlefield. Yet obviously good people died in other ways - in their beds, of dire illness, old age, etc. But I imagine they would have kept a weapon close by, to join the eternal battle and the eternal banquet on the other side.
> 
> A knarr is a type of cargo boat that accompanied the longboats on raids and trading missions, leaving the sleeker vessels unencumbered for maneuverability.


	11. Chapter 11

It is the first snowfall of the season. 

 

Kollgata tips her face to the sky, closing her eyes, letting the falling flakes prickle her skin with tiny bursts of cold.  With each icy touch memories return, memories of a cluster of tents, a mid-winter celebration – games and reindeer races and laughter.  She remembers nights falling asleep watching the sky dance with colour through the _lavvu’s_ open peak, a phenomenon said by the elders to be the blue-green spume of a giant whale.

 

She remembers it all, and then she pushes it all from her mind.  That is not her life now.

 

After filling the cradle she makes of her torn apron with split wood, Kollgata pushes her way back inside the warmth of the hut, awkwardly elbowing the door closed behind her.  It is then that she feels eyes upon her and turns slowly.

 

“You live.”

 

Pale as a winter’s moon, Romundr is half propped up, regarding her wanly from sunken sockets.

 

“I feel as though I wrestled a bear…and lost.”

 

Kollgata dumps her load beside the hearth, pausing to brush the chips of bark from her clothing before speaking again.

 

“You visited the gates of your Valhalla.”

 

Romundr looks around the abode, so cozy, so familiar.  “Yet here I am, back in Hafnarfjall.”

 

“Are you sorry you are here, instead of with your gods?”  Kollgata had not considered this.  These Northmen seem to revel in a warrior’s death, even to seek it.  Perhaps he will resent her for robbing him of this glory.

 

But she is immediately reassured.

 

“No,” grunts Romundr, his voice gaining strength.  “The gods sent me back because I have more living to do.”

 

He looks so smug, Kollgata cannot resist a teasing jest.  “Perhaps they found you lacking.”

 

Romundr shifts uncomfortably, knowing full well he did not appear at Odin’s portal with a battlewound.

 

“Pah!” he spits out, feigning insult, until he sees the hint of mischief in her eyes.  Eyes that see too much.  Eyes that bring him overwhelming joy to behold once again.  He watches her, as she busies herself heating water over the hearthfire.

 

“What happened with your apron?” he asks suddenly, when he notices the unevenly torn hemline.

 

“Look at your leg.”

 

Even the effort of pushing aside the furs and blankets is a chore for his shaky limbs, but Romundr perseveres, taking stock of his being.  It is clear, someone has been caring for him; his skin is cleaner than the last time he recalls; his thigh is neatly wrapped in the missing strips of apron fabric; his pelvis is swathed in loose linen.  He fingers the edge of the pale blue loincloth.

 

“Did you do this?”

 

Now Kollgata is pounding the stalks of some plant and placing them in the steeping pot.  She looks up for his meaning.

 

“No.  The men who bore you off the boat are the ones who gird you.  I guess they did not want you to catch cold.”  She smiles at her own joke, then adds, “The dressing is my work.”

 

Bearing a steaming bowl in both hands, Kollgata comes to the bedside.  Briefly, she glances at his wound, pleased to note that the swelling has receded, the redness has not spread.

 

“Cover yourself now,” she admonishes him.  “Later, I will change the compress.  In the meanwhile, drink this.  Chew and swallow the greens.”

 

“My belly is as empty as a river in drought, and you give me naught but watered down pig’s fodder,” grumbles Romundr, but he takes the hot broth gratefully, sipping with his beard bobbing.  The warmth seems to reach his very toes.

 

“We will see how your stomach fares with this first,” Kollgata says, almost gently.  Then she gathers her cloak from a chairback and heads for the door.

 

“You abandon me so soon?”  There is a flicker of disappointment in Romundr’s face.

 

“I go to fetch the shipwright,” explains Kollgata.  “You are very weak.  You will need his help.”  She knows she cannot support his weight for off bed forays.

 

“Tell him to bring a roast ox,” suggests Romundr, his spirits brightening.

 

Kollgata rolls her eyes.  “I will bring some gamalost.”

 

*******************

 

“It must have been a fearsome warrior who gave you this.”

 

The last coil of bandaging unwinds under the careful guidance of Kollgata’s  fingers, and she gently brushes away the dried paste beneath.  The gash, though still angry, is suppurating only clear fluid now, rather than the sickly yellow pus brought home from Frisia.

 

Leg bent, head and shoulders supported by a mountain of pillows, Romundr watches her dark head as it bobs over her ministrations.

 

“It was no warrior,” he admits uncomfortably.  “It was a woman.”

 

Kollgata pauses, raising an eyebrow, as she stirs the bowl of fresh _boska_ paste.

 

“Your kind are not so used to the women you defile fighting back,” she observes, hiding her distaste at the picture in her mind.  “She must wish her aim had been better.”

 

“She wishes nothing.  She is dead.”

 

Kollgata meets and holds his gaze, reminded of the violence of which he is capable, not wanting to know more, yet holding her breath.

 

“And I did not defile her,” Romundr adds gruffly.  “I paid for her.”  Though once she lay bleeding on the floor he took back his payment --  a fact that Kollgata does not need to know.

 

Seeing he will say no more about it, Kollgata continues likewise in silence, applying a new measure of the sacred medicament, then re-wrapping his wound as before.  Under, around, down – her hands brush his skin, graceful, firm when pressure is required, featherlight where nerves are sensitive.

 

The moments seem to attenuate, until all that exists is this intimacy – her touch, his scent, her breathing, his heartbeat.  Romundr cannot help but wish her hands might stray; he may be weakened, but he is further and further from death’s door with every passing minute.

 

Soon, his breechcloth is straining to contain his burgeoning recovery.

 

At first, Kollgata attempts to ignore the obvious, but that quickly becomes a ludicrous proposition.

 

“I see you are feeling stronger,” she quips dryly, while she tucks the last corner of cloth in on itself.

 

“It is your own doing,” Romundr suggests with mock severity.  “All that gamalost you feed me.”

 

Shaking her head in exasperation, Kollgata stands to leave his bedside, but Romundr catches her arm.

 

“Are you going to take care of this…or am I?”

 

The hopeful challenge hangs in the air like a snowslab waiting to rush down a mountainside.

 

Blinking her unfathomable dark eyes, Kollgata slowly slips her wrist from his grasp.

 

“I will leave you to your own measures.”

 

Clenching his jaw in frustration, Romundr turns his face angrily to the wall, refusing to relent even when the creak of the closing door reaches his ears.

 

*****************

 

Blind with emotion, Kollgata stomps heedlessly through the snow, her mind aswirl.  Her fervor is unfocused, shattering around her in pieces too many to gather up.  Arousal, confusion, fear, outrage.  Mostly rage.

 

She is angry – with herself, with the world, with the timing of the gods, with Romundr.  She will not service him like a whore, not by need or command.  They must come together as equals.

 

Intellectually, she knows this is a stance she cannot maintain; he owns her.  If he is now moved to forego their pact, there is little she can do.  Yet her pride balks.

 

Ducking into the lee of a quiet corner, Kollgata turns her back to the wall and hugs her arms, holding her questions close to her heart.   Were he to make a less clumsy, more respectful appeal, would her senses mellow, would the outcome be different?

 

She feels the answer in the flush at the small of her back, in the flutter of her pulse in her throat.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It is accurate, that in Sami culture the Northern Lights were said to be the out flow from a giant whale.


	12. Chapter 12

A rousing cheer goes up from the men lounging around the mead tun, as one of their own makes his first appearance in weeks.

 

“Roarsson!  We gave you up for dead!” someone shouts.  The nearest of the Northmen salutes him with the blade of his axe.  Another shoves a drinking horn in Romundr’s hand.  Ginnar steps forward and embraces him warmly.

 

“This one time, we will not spar,” the ginger-haired man chuckles.  “But next time…”  Ginnar jumps into a defensive stance, hand on his belt knife, drawing laughter from the crowd. 

 

Romundr allows himself to be pressed into a crude chair fashioned from a stump, although he is feeling quite hearty.  Kollgata has been feeding him so well, he’s had to poke another notch in the leather round his waist.  In order to re-awaken his disused muscles, he has spent many hours splitting logs for the winter, and each day rowing the circumference of the inner harbor.  He feels to be a man once again, and he drains his honeywine with relish to celebrate.

 

“To life!”  Romundr exalts, holding out his vessel for a refill.  “I am a fortunate man.”

 

One of the warriors who transported him from the docks that day lingers with his drink aloft and catches Romundr’s eye.  “Your thrall would not let the Valkyrie take you.”

 

Ginnar speaks loudly over the murmurs of skepticism that ripple through the ranks of those gathered.  “It is true.  She is a skilled healer.”

 

“She must be formidable indeed, to deny Odin his due,” remarks the leading skeptic. 

 

“She is,” says Romundr quietly, his blue eyes icy with conviction.

 

From the edge of the group, another voice rings out. 

 

“You must have something formidable yourself, something she _truly_ appreciates.”  An indolent smile creeps across Rothergus’ face, and he shares a knowing wink with his brother.

 

“Kollgata is well served,” huffs Romundr, sending a warning look in Ginnar’s direction.  The shipwright buries his face in his drink to hide his look of bemusement. 

 

Amidst the masculine guffaws, Romundr sighs inwardly.  After that fateful and frustrating day, Kollgata has left him to change his own dressing, no matter how many times he has feigned fumbling and ineptitude.  Now the wound is closed; there is no more need for such care, no more call for such intimacy.

 

And yet there is a tantalizing memory that haunts him, a fleeting impression of tenderness that swirls at the edge of his consciousness, that dances seductively just out of reach of his knowing.

 

*******************

 

That evening, Romundr returns to his hearth to find it decorated with something more welcome than a _nisse_ , more comforting than a _Jul_ log.  Face to the warmth, Kollgata is sleeping on the hide rug before the fire, the slope of her hips accentuated in her sideways twist.  One hand is curled in the dead bear’s fur, the other pillows her tousled head.

 

Lost in the visions that come with slumber, she breathes slowly, her eyelashes fluttering against her flushed cheeks.  For several long moments, Romundr watches her, his lungs gradually matching rhythm with hers as he slips into his own trance, reeling in the wisps of mystery that elude him.

 

Eventually, he tiptoes to his bed and strips off a blanket to cover her.  Yet as gentle as he tries to be, the motion of the descending woolen awakens her.

 

Kollgata sits up in silence, pulling the covering more closely about her, hugging her knees.  Romundr drops down, shoulder to shoulder, sharing the quietude, entranced by the spell of the fire sprites flitting along their wooden pathways. 

 

His voice cracks when he opens his mouth.

 

“Of what do you dream?”

 

The only sound is the hiss and snap of the settling logs.

 

“Do you dream of the man you lost?  The children you never had?”

 

“That was another lifetime,” says Kollgata softly, after a break so long Romundr thinks she has chosen not to answer him.  She pauses again, seeking new expression.  “I dream of a green land…a plot to call my own…a time of plenty.”

 

Romundr glances at her in profile.  Kollgata swivels her head and returns the query.

 

“What is it _you_ dream of?”

 

Turning a wistful countenance back to the flames, Romundr replies with much less hesitation.  “An end to wars…a farm…a family.”  Simple things, similar things.  Kollgata realizes this, even if he does not.

 

Meeting her gaze once again, Romundr says in a new voice, “When I lay in the fever, I had a strange dream.”

 

Kollgata attends his words warily.

 

“A strange and wonderful dream,” Romundr continues in a confessor’s tone.  “You and I…our bodies were entwined like paired dragonflies on the wing.  It was warm and peaceful.  I never wished to leave.”

 

Eyes liquid, Kollgata whispers, “It was no dream.  You were so cold.  I had to do something to fend off the chill.”

 

Fervency and longing roll over Romundr in a wave.  “Would that I had been awake.  And whole.”

 

“I wish that also,” admits Kollgata gravely.

 

“I am both now…”

 

Extending his forearm, Romundr cups her face in invitation, finding softness beyond his imaginings.  Kollgata leans into his palm, reveling in the feel of his callouses against her skin.  Sliding her hands up his chest, she grabs him by the braids and pulls him to her.

 

The surprise burst of pain and pleasure is a powerful incentive to Romundr’s body.  He returns the favor with bruising kisses that steal the very breath from Kollgata’s being.  Inarticulate sounds of urgency echo back and forth, throat to throat, tongue to tongue.  Hungry hands tear at clothing; eager limbs strain to be freed.  It becomes a contest to see who can strip down more quickly.

 

Romundr wins the race by mere seconds, and then Kollgata is in his arms, in his head, in his senses.  His journey of discovery is profound, as he explores her with his caresses and with his kisses – nibbling here, stroking there, tasting the heat of her, trailing his fingers along the softness of her.

 

Kollgata likewise takes her fill of his body, thrilling to the slide of his muscles beneath her palms – so supple, so hard.  Long have her heart and her flesh ached for this moment.  When Romundr covers her and joins their loins, she wraps her legs around his thighs, holding him deep, heedless of the press of the floor in the small of her back.

 

Sweating, writhing, rolling – the rock of Romundr’s hips becomes a subtle struggle for more freedom of movement on Kollgata’s part, until the moment when he raises himself too high and she slips out from under him, grinning.  With a growl of passion, he clasps her ankle before she can wriggle away, only to have her throw her weight at his chest, sending him into his back.  Quick as a snake, she straddles his belly, holding a finger to her lips to silence any protest.

 

Romundr is acutely aware of the place where their skin touches, the place where her moisture waits.  His nerves prickle with anticipation, as Kollgata languorously traces a fingernail outline of every feather of the raven’s wings spanning his pectorals.  Finally her hand follows the furry trail down his abdomen to claim him, to slowly envelop him once again inside her, stealing a moan of satisfaction from them both.

 

The firelight gives the lovers the aspect of gods – he of ancient strength and winged shadows, she of eternal flame and wild mystery.  As steady as a drumbeat, as undulating as the waves, their bodies find a common tempo.  A surge like the thousand year tide builds rapidly, until it overtakes them in a swirling, pounding, foaming maelstrom, wringing the life from their limbs and a cry from their throats.

 

 

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Nisse are small, mythological gnome-like creatures who guard the hearth and home, as long as the homeowner keeps them happy with porridge and butter.


	13. Chapter 13

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Although this chapter begins whimsically, there are memories unearthed here which could be triggering for some readers. See the original tags for the fic. As always, I try to tread lightly over problem areas.

“Surely I have taken leave of my senses,” mutters Kollgata to the squawking seabirds who laugh at her from their perches on the pier.

 

One tentative foot follows the other, until she is crouched awkwardly in the bottom of the rowboat, arms clutching the sides dramatically to brace against the gentle rocking.  The look on her face is one of tension and mild terror.  Romundr finds it comical.

 

“Calm yourself,” he says with a chuckle.  “We are only making a short tour of the inner harbor, not taking a voyage on the high seas.”

 

Settling her body squarely in the center of the floorboards, Kollgata peers over the side, wondering how deep the water might be and what lies beneath its surface.  She much prefers dry land.

 

“How can you be so nervous?” chides Romundr, as he unships the oars and pulls them away from the dock.

 

“Have you ever seen Sami in boats?” retorts Kollgata from the relative safety of the nest of furs she makes for herself, to ward off the chill of the waning day.

 

“No,” admits Romundr, his shoulders rolling in rhythm.  “You shall be the first.”  He smiles at her encouragingly.  “It is not so difficult.  I had my sea legs before I could walk.”

 

“I’d like to see you ride a reindeer,” remarks Kollgata dryly, putting a point to the differences in their cultures.  “Also _easy._ ”  The short-bodied ungulates have a decidedly unusual gait compared to the fjord stallions.

 

Romundr lifts an eyebrow in her direction, but says no more.  The shoreline is falling away rapidly, as Romundr guides their little craft straight across the inlet to the headland.

 

“You promised to stay close to land!”  Kollgata accuses him in alarm when she sees the wide expanse of ripples surrounding them.  Her sense of vertigo spikes dangerously.

 

“We will miss the kiss of the siblings if we do not make haste.”

 

Kollgata is baffled by this cryptic statement, yet she must be content to wait for whatever it is he means to share.  Her attention is wholly consumed with calming her being.

 

Gradually she begins to relax, her inner ear finding new equilibrium with the fluid plane upon which she floats.  By the time they troll to a stop near the window on the west, the place where the arms of land open to the great sea, Kollgata is lying back watching the last rays of the sun turn the cloud patterns into bands of fire.  Romundr joins her under the furs, pulling her head against his neck.

 

“Sister Sol.  Escorted by chariot across the sky, chased by wolves, so destined until the coming of Ragnarok.”  He recites the sun-legend the way he learned it at his mother’s knee, with a child’s awe.  Then, with one lazy dip of an oar, he swivels the boat around to the east, where the full moon is just appearing over the mountain’s shoulder.

 

“Brother Mani, rising upon his own chariot.  Only one day in thirty are the siblings directly across from each other, to meet and touch across the horizon.”

 

“And what is Ragnarok?” queries the woman from another world.

 

“The end of all things.”  Romundr relays this with the practical fatalism that permeates so much of his people’s outlook.

 

Kollgata shivers.  “Your myths are sad.  And terrible.”

 

Romundr’s strong arm tightens around her upper body, and his lips graze her forehead.

 

“I am glad you and I found each other across the divide,” he murmurs reflectively, truthfully.  A chance ambush, an impulsive choice – two lives changed forever on that day.  Kollgata signals her agreement with a deep kiss.

 

The lovers drift between land and sea, between light and dark, between sun and moon, sharing warmth and silent memories until the evenstar appears in the duskling sky.

 

Kollgata feels her soul drawn to the winking jewel, so alone in the twilight.

 

“Does the first star have a story?”

 

“Write your own,” shrugs Romundr, his limited imagination at a loss.  The woman in his embrace pauses long before she reveals her tale.

 

“Wanderer Kolli,” she murmurs.  “Adrift in the space between two worlds.”  She burrows deeper against him. “Anchored by the spell of a mighty warrior.”

 

Romundr grunts, but he is secretly pleased.  Something inside him settles into place, washing him with a feeling of contentment.

 

In time, as false blue fades and true black inks the heavens, the starlight canopy reveals itself.  Enchanted by the heavens, Kollgata unearths a question that has long troubled her, and posits it in her direct way.

 

“I must know why you never took me by force.”

 

The past days of passion have been well worth the wait; therefore, she cannot help but wonder at Romundr’s self-control.

 

“I found you to be a hideous hag,” he teases with a straight face.

 

Kollgata considers him gravely for a moment.  “I might believe you, were it not for the evidence between your thighs.”

 

A bearded chin dips, acceding to her observation, hoping to hide from a reply.

 

Kollgata tries again, sensing a truth that needs to be told.  “Why did you allow me to keep my dignity?”

 

Carried along by the flow of words as much as he is trapped by their isolation on the water, Romundr grows pensive, his voice still.

 

“I know what it is to be powerless and violated.”

 

Kollgata tries to meet his eyes, but he keeps his gaze averted.  “What do you know of it?” she asks quietly.

 

Romundr swallows hard, and then it all spills out – things he has never told a living soul, things he stopped recalling long ago.

 

“The eorl of the village where I grew up had a taste for cruelty and young boys.”  He swallows again, fighting the bile and the memories.  “I was one of his favorites.”

 

“Your parents allowed this.”  The most cruel thing of all, if true.  Kollgata feels her stomach turn.

 

“They did not know.  Or at least I never told them.  The eorl threatened their life.”

 

Finally Romundr turns his anguished face to hers.

 

“What was a boy to do?”  All his shame, all his rage, all his helplessness, boil to the surface in that one sentence.

 

Cupping his cheek with her palm, Kollgata comforts the child within.  “None of this was your fault.  None of it.”

 

“But why?”  The mighty warrior whispers the question that has haunted all his days, given wind to launch all his nightmares. 

 

“I cannot say.”  Kollgata sighs in sorrow.  “Your gods must be uncaring.”  Softly, her lips land on the knot of tension between his brows.  “But you defied them.  You survived.”

 

She kisses him again, and he returns her touch as a man, no longer the tortured boy.

 

“How did it end?” asks Kollgata after a period of silence, for she must know for her own mind.

 

“By the time I was sixteen, he had lost interest.  I stayed on at the farm to help my parents as they grew old.”  His voice is still thick with layers of defeat and deflection.  “After they went to the gods, I left.”

 

“A good son.”  An abrupt thought arises in Kollgata’s head, knitting her face in sudden fear and leaving her mouth before she can stop it.

 

“Did you have any brothers?”

 

Now a true sob escapes Romundr’s throat.

 

“One younger.  The eorl took him.  He never returned.”

 

Kollgata can only cradle his head until the shaking of his shoulders subsides.

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The Sister Sol, Brother Mani legend regarding the chariot chase and Ragnarok is genuine;  
> the kiss of the siblings is something I made up. It is true that there is only one day a month when the sun and moon are directly across from one another, and it is when the moon is full.


	14. Chapter 14

The procession of shaggy-shouldered men comes and goes throughout the short window of half-daylight.  None spend a long time inside the dwelling, but all are compelled to see the woman who resides there on this day.  Many bring gifts; some are more eager than others.  It is the winter solstice and every warrior will make this ritual visit to reaffirm life during the hours when the power of darkness reigns strongest.

 

Although it is mid-day, the sky reflects only a dim blueish light.  Romundr shuffles his boots in the snow, not from nerves but from cold, squinting through the eerie gloom at the doorway of the hut.  A man emerges, looking shaken, and veers off into the periphery of vision without acknowledging him.

 

Drawing a deep breath of calm, Romundr steps to the entrance and parts the clattering, ivory-coloured curtain.

 

“Ancient Mother,” he greets the seer with prescribed deference.  “The Sun Maiden has slipped below the horizon.  Accept my offerings to guide her to rebirth.”

 

Surrounded by trinkets and effigies, bits of food and carven likenesses of the gods, and with a basin of fire opposite her steepled fingers, the elder has no seating space to spare.  Yet she motions him inside.

 

“Is that Romundr Roarrson?” the old woman asks archly.  “Your new aura is unknown to me.  What have you brought?”

 

“I have fir boughs for your smudge pot.”  Romundr drops a prickly sack in a corner, then produces a small wrap of linen.  “And dried cod for your soup pot.”  This he sets among the seer’s yuletide bounty.

 

She reaches out a gnarled hand to grab up the fish roll and bring it to her nose.  Her lips, blackened with ceremonial bloodpaste, part in a grotesque smile.  She motions Romundr to draw closer and he does so, dropping into a crouch.

 

The old woman rocks back and forth, eyeing him with rheumy intensity.

 

“You are not the same Roarrson who came to me last season.”  She tosses something into the flames she tends, something that puts a heady aroma into the air.  “I do not need the runes to tell me your center is now calm.”

 

Inhaling deeply, Romundr considers her words and knows them to be true.  “It is as you say, Wise One.”

 

Seemingly half-addled, the shapeless crone mumbles unintelligibly while walking her fingers down each opposite arm.  A childish gesture, though to Romundr, this could just as easily be some method of conjuring.

 

Suddenly she pierces him with her bloodshot gaze.

 

“And what is the one thing easiest to possess, and most elusive to own?” 

 

The quandary posed at his last visit – he had almost forgotten it.  Face slackening as the realization dawns, Romundr breathes out the words.

 

“The heart of a woman.”

 

With motions more fluid than could rightfully be expected of one so aged, the seer carves signs in the smoke with the planes of her palms.  “You have solved one riddle, Romundr Roarrson,” she intones.  “Now I pose you another.”

 

“If you love something, how do you affirm it is truly yours?”

 

*********************

 

The press of her lips finds the spot on his shoulder blade he hasn’t thought about in years.

 

“This one?”

 

“My first raid.  A monk with a shovel.”

 

Kollgata kisses the scar gently and moves on, her warm breath leaving a trail of heat on his skin.

 

“And here?”  She tickles the permanent weal on his ribcage with her tongue.

 

Romundr flinches, grinning.  “Defending Hafnarfjall from the Black Dane.”

 

After his audience with the seer, Romundr had taken a long trek up the river valley, almost to the base of the falls where the water sprites live.  There he had built a fire, burned a lock of hair, shed a drop of blood – calling out in silence to the gods for a new direction.  Upon his return to the cabin, he had found every candle lit against the polar twilight, and a mischievous Kollgata waiting for him.

 

Now, wriggling under the furs, she moves lower, bypassing his pelvis to give attention to a misshapen kneecap.

 

“This bump?”

 

Throwing back the covers to keep a keen eye on her game, Romundr recalls, “A Frankish warhammer.  Wielded by a weakling.”  Indeed, Thor had spared him from being lamed that day.

 

He shifts his hips in hopeful anticipation as Kollagata slowly tongues her way up his thigh to the recent injury.

 

“I think we both know what happened here.”  She lands a chaste kiss on a corner of the still-pink flesh, while her loose locks brush his tightening balls.  Romundr holds his breath and grips the bedframe to keep from writhing.

 

“Your mouth could make better use a bit to the left,” he suggests impatiently, when the game goes no further.

 

Kollgata makes a thorough, if exaggerated, visual examination, then shakes her head.

 

“I see no scars here.”

 

“You are leaving some right now!” groans Romundr.  In another time, another place, he might force the issue.  But not this time, not this place.  Not this woman.

 

“Ah!” murmurs Kollgata, regarding him in the serene and unnerving way she has.  “I am a healer.”  Her voice softens, becoming a caress, at one with the touch of her hands.

 

“Therefore I must apply some healing.” 

 

And her mouth closes over him, bringing bliss.

 

*******************

 

Warmth radiates from her core, from the place where his tongue caresses her.  The feeling is exquisite, relentless, lapping at her consciousness.  Like a swollen river on the brink of overflowing its banks, like a watercourse building for its plunge off a cliff’s edge, her body is carried along by her senses.  When the final cascade comes, it shudders through her being, at once a release and a homecoming.

 

Afterwards, Kollgata lies in a languid dream, only dimly aware of Romundr as he carries his kisses down her leg.  Her skin registers the way he cups her heel with his hand and points her toes, the deft twist and gentle slide.

 

And then her ankle is bare.

 

Bolting up on her elbows in astonishment, Kollgata stares, first at her unencumbered leg, and then at the slave coil in Romundr’s palm.

 

“What are you doing?”  Her whispered question floats on the air between them – so simple, so profound.

 

Romundr tosses the hated anklet to the floorboards.  It lands with a dull clang and rolls away into the darkness.

 

“Making you a free woman.”

 

Catching her breath, Kollgata unwinds herself from his plane and sits all the way up, legs curled beneath her.

 

“Why?”

 

“So you might be my equal,” says Romundr past the gravel in his throat.  “And my wife.”

 

Her first instinct is to throw herself into his arms.  Yet she refrains, as does he.  What reason he hesitates to embrace her, she cannot say; he seems to be waiting for something.  Carefully, Kollgata takes time to consider her future.

 

Bending his limbs to sit cross-legged opposite her, Romundr ventures another option – the one he should have offered first.

 

“Would you instead return to your people?”  It is her right, his fear.  He swallows hard.  “I will help you find them.”

 

“I would not need your help,” replies Kollgata with precise honesty.  At the solstices, both summer and winter, all the Sami gather for trading and celebration in the Valley of the Moon, an ancient wellspring of power in the far North.  She has fond memories of the place – emotions which flicker across her face. 

 

“You will go then,” says Romundr quietly, when he sees her countenance.  He turns away – he has his answer.  “It is where you belong.”

 

“No.”  Kollgata takes his hands between hers, stroking his knuckles until he looks at her.

 

“No.  I will stay.”  Her voice grows stronger as her decision settles into place in her heart.

 

“I will stay.  We will belong to each other.”

 

Now joy descends upon the cabin, enveloping the lovers, granting them solace in each other’s arms, passion in each other’s touch.

 

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The Vikings did have some fears and rituals surrounding the winter solstice. The threat of being plunged into never-ending darkness was powerful, they wanted to encourage the Sun to return to the sky each year.
> 
> The Valley of the Moon is based on a night I spent in the village of Skibotn, an ancient meeting place in northern Norway used by the Sami. To quote from the diary I kept at the time: "I thought the moon over Skibotn was the most beautiful I'd ever seen -- bright white, ringed by mauve and grey-green clouds, nestled in the saddle between two snow-capped peaks. I could imagine the ancient nomads coming together here, maybe thinking the spot was mystical or magical somehow. I could almost feel it myself."


	15. Chapter Fifteen

Lifting her skirts high and clenching her jaws, Kollgata braces herself for the onslaught.  With quick and vigorous movements, she splashes the ice-cold river water between her legs, then steps back onshore to complete her washing ritual, giving diligent attention to armpits.  Lastly, she buries her face in her cupped hands, rinsing away the dried sweat and grime.  The slick lump of horse chestnut soap leaves a frothy residue to ride the current to the sea.

 

In warmer months, she would shower beneath the waterfall, but not today; this cursory bathing will have to suffice.  Teeth chattering as she yanks her woolen tunic back over her body, she resolves to press Romundr to acquire a bathing tub. 

 

The falls is but a lacy, trickling veil compared to what it will be in the spring.  Ice is forming in the eddies where the water pools in summer.  The autumn’s patch of _boska_ has suffered frostbite, yet there are still some seedheads and stalks worth preserving.  Humming softly to herself against the accompaniment of the falling water’s song, Kollgata selects those plants with a little life still left in them.  When her knapsack is nearly full, she turns back and pauses, running her fingers over another cluster, one that has fared differently, better, in the winter’s cold.  This she pulls up as well, wrapping it separately in a scrap of deerhide before adding it to her collection and slinging the entire lot over one shoulder and across her upper body.

 

*******************

 

Eyes.

 

Hungry eyes, hard eyes, cruel eyes.  Eyes watching her every move, staring at her nakedness, eyes hiding in the underbrush.

 

A shift of a cramped calf, a new crouch, a snapping twig. 

 

He freezes in place.

 

But she does not turn. 

 

The sound is masked by the rush of the river.

 

**********************

 

Two-thirds of the way home to Hafnarfjall, the arrow-straight trail leads through a copse of birch.  It is here that the hair on the nape of Kollgata’s neck first prickles.

 

 Something is behind her.

 

She whips around, finding only lonely trees to mock her fears.

 

Wary now, she hastens her footsteps, keeping one ear turned over her shoulder.  She adjusts her load so as to be more behind her, easing her mobility. 

 

It cannot be a bear – they are all aslumber in their dens. 

 

A wolf?  A fox?  A curious canine would be no worry, yet she wishes it would show itself.

 

A big cat.  Not incapable of mounting a stealthy ambush of a human.  Kollgata slides her knife from its sheath and into her palm.

 

More rustling at her back, closer now.

 

Sweeping the forest with her eyes, Kollgata calls out, “What beast shares my path?”  She will confront the animal, communicate to it that they must not be a threat to one another.

 

Sudden movement at the periphery of her vision.

 

From behind a pale tree trunk scarred with black steps Rothergus, wearing a wicked grin.

 

“No one here to protect you this time.”  His eyes glitter with intent, fixing on her slight form – so helpless, so defenseless, as all thralls should be.  He could rush her at any moment, but he has rather enjoyed stalking his prey.

 

Kollgata’s mouth goes dry, even as she calculates the distance between them and bends her wrist behind her.  She knows she cannot overpower him or outrun him, so long as all things remain equal.  She has one chance.

 

Sliding slowly backwards against the nearest birch, she crooks a finger, beckoning him closer, praying the gods he will take the pounding of her heart for passion.

 

“I’ve been waiting for you,” she purrs seductively.  “Romundr bores me.”

 

Rothergus swaggers near.  He had thought he wanted her to fight, but he cannot resist the chance to improve on anything that Romundr has done.  Pinning her with his bulk, he gropes inside her tunic, squeezing a breast so hard Kollgata gasps.

 

“I will send you back to him unable to walk,” he promises, with spittle forming at the corners of his lips.

 

Fighting revulsion, Kollgata glances down between their bodies. 

 

“Show me.”

 

Smirking, Rothergus follows her gaze and reaches for his waistband.

 

It is the last thing his left eye ever sees.

 

His shriek splits the air, rising to the treetops.  Kollgata pulls her knife from his socket and stumbles out of reach, as Rothergus falls to his knees, clutching half his face, bright red welling from between his fingers.

 

At the disturbance, a crow sentinel sounds the alarm and scatters his flock to the winds.

 

Kollgata runs like she has never run before in her life.

 

*********************

 

Bursting from the trees with lungs heaving, Kollgata looks around wildly to get her bearings.  Her tangential escape route appears to have brought her out near the smokehouse.  A steady circling of greedy gulls marks the place.  Charred chimney stones funnel heat and steam from the central firepit inside the round mud structure.  Outside, the day’s catch is strewn across long rows of bloody tables, where scores of slaves gut fish with rusty knives – blades doled out and carefully collected again at the end of labor. 

 

After concealing her shoulderbag between the wall and some weeds, Kollgata slips into the row of women and lays hand to the next limp cod, burying her already crimson steel into its belly, losing all traces of Rothergus’ blood in the piscine entrails, disguising the splatter on her skirts with new outflow.

 

Amina stands nearby, across the table, wielding her tool awkwardly and wearing a look of nausea.  After several attempts, she manages to scrape out the innards of the fish in front of her, shoving the visceral mess into the trough that runs down the center of the work area.  When she spies her friend, a wan smile parts her face.

 

“Kollgata!  Where have you been?  I did not see you earlier.”

 

Kollgata blinks, hesitates, needing an alibi with lost time built in. 

 

“I…I was folding nets,” she lies, citing an activity closer to the docks. None are likely to mark one slave more or less in any group endeavor.  “They sent me over here when that task was finished.”

 

“I wish _this_ task were finished,” bemoans Amina, drawing a dripping wrist across her forehead and chucking her fish by the tail into the barrow behind her.

 

Kollgata silently echoes this thought, realizing she will need to remain with this crew for the duration in order to reinforce the narrative regarding her whereabouts.

 

Will Rothergus seek vengeance?  What is the weight of the word of a former slave against that of a free-born warrior?  Will he be too shamed to have been bested by a woman, to make a public accusation?

 

Beyond the building and the curing racks, she watches as Rothergus lurches off the path and turns towards his own holdings, for now only intent on emergency aid.

 

A cold finger walks down Kollgata’s spine.  It is not over, of that she is certain.

 

 

 

 

 


	16. Chapter 16

In amongst the pine boughs dark wings rustle, as the murder comes to life with clicks and burrs – a language known only to corvids.  At the tallest conifer’s highest point, the watcher stretches his neck and twists his glossy black head, noting the activity of the flightless two-legs as they awaken and exit their strange square roosts.

 

Soon his beady eyes spy a figure marching purposefully through the village.  Something stirs in his feathered breast – a keen unease, a vague sense of similarity.  Silently the bird takes to the air, leaving a limb bouncing once free of his weight, sending a cascade of dislodged overnight snow to the ground.

 

His lazy descent brings him on parallel with the two-leg’s path, a course that ends at  a simple cabin still wrapped in quietude, with a finger of smoke rising from the chimney.  The crow lands on one bony palm of the moose skull that marks the doorway and caws loudly, waking the occupants seconds before their visitor pounds on the oaken barrier.

 

Groaning under his breath, Romundr considers ignoring the summons.  The hours of his life are exceedingly pleasant now, with Kolli by his side.  Stimulating days of shared adventures blend seamlessly into long nights of love-making, unfolding once again in late mornings of sleepy warmth.  He has never been happier.  May the gods curse whoever stands beyond the threshold.

 

The pummeling resumes.  “Roarsson!  I know you are within!”

 

“A moment!” Romundr shouts at the ceiling.  “Stay,” he whispers to Kollgata with a brush of his lips, as he extricates himself from their embrace.  She burrows deeper under the furs and blankets, while Romundr dons his breeches and strides angrily to the door.

 

He is astonished to find the brother of Rothergus filling the entrance.  As always, he remarks mentally on the familial similarity.

 

“Torvald the Lesser,” Romundr names him formally.  “Why do you disturb me in my home?”

 

The younger man shows no remorse for the early morning interruption.  “I have business with your thrall.”  He jerks his chin in the direction of the room’s interior.

 

“You will go through me.”  Romundr takes a step forward, blocking Torvald’s view with the wingspan on his chest.  Behind him, the bedclothes shift as Kollgata rolls over to watch the conversation warily.

 

Torvald clenches a fist in frustration.  “My brother was set upon and stabbed in the eye.”

 

Romundr snorts.  “What is that to me?  I will call him One-Eye from now on.”

 

Taut as a lyre string, Kollagta waits – waits for the accusation, waits for the bloodshed sure to follow.  But it does not come.

 

Unwitting, Torvald glances to where he imagines Kollgata to be, then back to Romundr.  “The wound is grievous.  We put a hot stone to it, but it festers.”

 

Romundr shrugs.  “Again, what is this to do with me?  Seek the eorl’s justice.”

 

Torvald scowls darkly.  “There will be no justice.  It was a blind ambush.  Gus did not see his attacker.”  With the realization that ego is hiding the truth, Kollgata’s heartbeat slows.  For now, she is safe.

 

“Then why are you here?” demands Romundr impatiently.  His bladder is full and his well of interest empty.  This conversation needs to come to a swift conclusion.

 

Torvald stubbornly stands his ground.  “Your witch.  Tell her to give us a potion.  Like she gave to you.”

 

A small smile plays around Romundr’s mouth.  “I tell her nothing.”  He turns his body to include her in their exchange.  “Kollgata is a free woman.”

 

Taken aback, Torvald stares directly at Kollgata.  “Show me.”

 

Holding his gaze and relishing every moment, Kollgata slips her naked shin out from under the skins and wiggles her toes at him. 

 

Torvald’s face falls in defeat.  “When did you make this so?” he demands of Romundr.

 

Without blinking an eye, Romundr lies, “Before we sailed.”  It amuses him to backdate the time of when he gave Kollgata her agency.  In truth, he should have done it sooner.

 

“And so you see,” he continues, “I cannot command her to give you healing for your brother.  That decision is hers.”  He would wager there is no remedy forthcoming. 

 

Sitting up cloaked in a layer of woolen, Kollagata speaks for the first time, almost purring.  “It is true, I have no reason or requirement to give you aid.”  She pauses long, seeing many things in her mind’s eye – things that have been, things that are, things that will be. 

 

Finally, she nods.  “Nevertheless, I will make him something.”

 

As she rises to put action to words, the heavy blanket slips down her spine, revealing the curve of her back, the hint of her hips.  Torvald’s eyes follow her greedily.

 

Romundr cuffs him soundly and shoves him out the door.

 

“Do not entertain any of your brother’s ideas, or I will see to it you lose more than an eye.”

 

Once under the grey-streaked sky, Romundr visits the four corners of his abode, marking a line with his pale yellow stream – a warning to predators, a deterrent to vermin.  The cold nips at his bare torso, perking his skin.  He might like to go inside to fetch more clothing, but he would be a fool to leave the demanding brother of his antagonist alone on his property.  And so the two mill around the woodpile until Torvald breaks the awkward silence with an odd observation, an attempt to demonstrate superior knowing.

 

“The freeing of a slave requires a public declaration.”

 

“Are you suddenly a scholar?” scoffs Romundr, as he takes up the axe from the chopping stump and swings it down into the wood, for the sheer exhilarating exertion of it.

 

Torvald’s tone is laced with surety.  “Any thrall found without their ankle marker may be executed on sight.”  He smiles smugly.  “Unless their freedom is made knowledge.”

 

Pausing uneasily in the act of lining up a half-hewn length of wood for the blade, Romundr asks, “How do you know this?”  Having never before kept a slave, his awareness of thrall-law is minimal.  He knows the life of a slave is worth no more than that of a beast of burden.

 

Torvald gives a nonchalant tilt of his head.  “My father wished to quietly free his bastard son by one of the bed-slaves.  The boy was found with his throat slit and his ankle severed.”  He neglects to mention that it was he and Rothergus who way-laid and eliminated the threat to their birthright.  Standing the tell-tale foot atop the corpse’s chest was a nice touch, he recalls.

 

The only reply from Romundr is the crack of a splitting log.

 

Fortunately, Kollgata soon emerges with a woven tunic slung across one elbow.  In her cupped hands, she bears a small collection of dried seeds.  She spares Romundr a tight smile when he takes his woolen from her. 

 

“Do you have a grinding stone?” she queries Torvald.

 

“I have the hilt of my knife and a flat surface.”  He sidesteps the question, uncertain of the tools on hand for household chores he considers beneath him.

 

With great care, Kollgata brushes the contents of her palms into Torvald’s outstretched hand.

 

“Make a powder of this.”  She plucks the last seed from between her fingers, drops it, and closes his fist around her gift.  “Put it in his ale.”

 

She blinks guilelessly.  “Be sure he takes it all.”     

 

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There is ample research establishing that crows are able to recognize distinct human faces. They might, however, be momentarily fooled by a strong family resemblance.


End file.
